


Still the Same

by pastelsunset



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Canon Universe, Eventual Happy Ending, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Famous Harry Styles, Famous Liam Payne, Famous Louis Tomlinson, Famous Niall Horan, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Friendship/Love, Love/Hate, M/M, One Direction Hiatus, Post-One Direction, Recreational Drug Use, Slow Build, Slow Burn, because harry and louis never broke up irl, minor elounor but it’s a stunt, technically this isn’t canon but it is if you squint
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-07
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:47:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 34,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26335912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pastelsunset/pseuds/pastelsunset
Summary: Harry and Louis’ relationship didn’t survive the hiatus. But with three albums written about each other and the impending 10-year One Direction anniversary, they find themselves back at the beginning: strangers drawn together like gravity. And it still feels the same.
Relationships: Harry Styles/Louis Tomlinson
Comments: 23
Kudos: 77





	1. Still, Somehow

**Author's Note:**

> This story is fiction (obviously). Never happened. Though this is based on real people, this story does not reflect them or their reality in the slightest. That being said, this story is mine so please do not distribute it in anyway without my explicit permission. 
> 
> Fic title & premise inspired by the song "Still the Same" by SHY Martin & Boy in Space.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Their breakup wasn’t like a couple of divorced parents that tossed the children back and forth: Louis, Harry, Liam and Niall were all friends. But it’s a different type of friends now than they were when the band was still together. Louis and Harry didn’t make them choose a side, there aren’t sides. But the whole thing feels like a bridge and Louis’ on one side and Harry’s on the other, and Liam and Niall spend their time walking between the two. Sometimes the bridge is shorter, and Harry and Louis can talk to each other. Other times they’re only separated by a few feet. But sometimes, times like these, the bridge is a mile long and Niall and Liam don’t have time to run and Harry’s got asthma and Louis is a drunk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Song of the Chapter: Perfect Now
> 
> DISCLAIMER: This story is fiction (obviously). Never happened. Though this is based on real people, this story does not reflect them or their reality in the slightest.

**May 2019**

_> >_ **_Given Half the Chance_ ** _< <_

Louis pulls the cigarette from his mouth, letting it dangle between his index and middle fingers as he lets the nicotine linger in his chest. With a deep exhale, he blows the smoke out to cloud over his view of the setting sun. His balcony is cooling as night approaches, but the effects of the cigarettes and alcohol thrumming in his veins keep him warm.

He leans back against his chair and his head knocks against the top of the frame. He imagines he can see the sun inching below the horizon, its slow movements as imperceptible as his heart beating in his chest. The sky is orange and pink bordered with the deep purple of impending darkness and it’s beautiful like a classical painting but it’s blurring in and out of focus as his mind wanders.

In front of him, on his glass table, is an overused journal; leather falling apart at the seams and papers threatening to dislodge from their threads and float off into the sunset-painting. Next to it is a freshly opened bottle of Jack Daniels. There’s a stain on one of the disheveled papers from the dribbled liquid too, spilled in Louis’ haste to pour a drink. Lyrics on that page are scrawled in Louis’s inebriated handwriting, even more sloppy and illegible than usual. He thinks he should have written them in his phone so that he could actually read them without effort when he wakes up with a headache in the morning, but he has to get use out of the thing until it disintegrates so it all means something more than just this _thing_ sent halfway across the globe.

Harry gave him the journal last year. He stumbled upon it in some secondhand shop in a small French town outside of Paris. The person who had handed it over to the place had apparently inscribed his own name into the inner cover: carving “ _William_ ” into the rough leather in crooked cursive. On the inside of the back cover was the date the journal was bound, stamped “ _1991_.” Of course Harry had thought of him. So he sent it. That was all they were reduced to now, gifts sent haphazardly to each other like pen pals from childhood. Often, Harry’s were received without so much as a note. When he’d post the package, he’d send a text to Louis along the lines of “expect something soon” and which address he sent it to. With the gift, he’d leave a notecard or a torn piece of paper with “H” written light in pencil like a second-guessed breath. Louis sent his with letters. Sometimes they were long. Sometimes it was just a sentence. Louis hasn’t sent anything in a while, much less written anything to Harry outside of song lyrics printed drunkenly in the journal-gift from him.

Louis’ phone buzzes several times in succession against the glass table, the vibration loud and abrupt. He pops open his eyes in shock, unaware they had closed and leans forward. He places the cigarette between his teeth so he can clasp both hands around the device.

 **LOTTIE:** how are you xx

 **LOTTIE:** are you visiting soon?

 **LOTTIE:** the twins are asking about you.

Louis tosses the phone back onto the table with a clatter, taking another drag of his cigarette so he can sigh the smoke back out. He knows she knows he was supposed to be on a flight back to London already, and this is her way of telling him. She’s guilting him into explaining why he never sent their customary “plane’s about to take off” text exchange. But he doesn’t know. He meant to get on the plane. He even meant to go to the airport. His bags are packed, still by the door. He only meant to have a cigarette before calling the car service. But the cigarette turned two then three and then a glass of Jack Daniels just to take the edge off turned into a second. And then he started writing.

And then he thought of Harry.

And now he’s on his third Jack Daniels.

“There’s a song in there somewhere,” Louis mutters to himself as he watches the fan on the ceiling rotate in the light gusts of wind.

He brings the cigarette back up to his mouth, just letting it sit between his lips as he breathes in and out of his nose. All around him smells like himself: whiskey, smoke, paper, and the lingering stench of general LA smog. When he’s in London, the LA smell is replaced with the smell of rain. _That’s what our perfume should’ve smelled like_ , he thinks, _liquor, smoke and rain; would’ve been more authentic_. It was a running joke ever since it was released that whenever someone said “something smells”—usually Liam, he’s got the most sensitive nose—the other lads would joke about a new perfume coming out: pizza, sweaty armpits, and cologne; dirty socks, stale bread, and booze; nicotine, marijuana, and cocaine.

It took Louis months to get the smell of Harry out of his LA apartment. They each had separate secret places they liked to meet at, rather than their respective large houses that were consistently monitored. And even after, Louis still prefers the penthouse to the large empty mansion when he’s alone. But the smaller shared space was saturated in Harry. He has some of Harry’s things still, and that he doesn’t mind, but the lingering scent was painful. The rosey cedar sweet smell would overwhelm him. He chain-smoked for days after that last moment together. The apartment reeked of nicotine and smoke, but it was better than smelling Harry every time he closed his eyes. The apartment is all Louis now, though, and smells entirely of him. But he does have a candle hidden deep in his closet that smells of Harry. There was a rumor it smelled like Harry’s cologne and Louis had to test it out and see. And it does. It’s not quite Harry, but it’s enough. And Louis pulls it out when he’s writing songs or drunk or both.

Harry and his smell came back twice after their breakup. Once when Louis’ mother died, and he’d stayed a week. Then, again, he came over for two days after his sister went too. They fucked once the first time, but didn’t the next time, because it didn’t end well the first time.

They couldn’t make it through the hiatus. They’d tried. But it was hard. There was no excuse for them to still be seen together. And Louis was still signed to Modest! It felt natural to let their relationship dissolve the same way the band did: suddenly and with loose ends that would perhaps tie themselves or be tied together if they ever reunited. Harry was going one direction, Louis another, so it made sense to split. They’re friends, of course, but not the sort of friends they’d wish to be. There’s too much between them, too much history, too many things that draw them together like magnets.

Louis takes a final drag of his cigarette, pulling it from his mouth and smashing out the sparks in the ash tray. He blows out a final breath of smoke, a fog that settles over his lyrics, his phone and into the open bottle of whiskey. He gathers the falling out pages of his journal, rifling them back into place before closing the leather covers and wrapping the band around it to keep it bound tight. He tucks the journal under his armpit and places his abandoned phone in his pocket. He looks once at the ashtray full of discarded cigarette butts, then up at the sunset-painting slowly darkening in the sky and thinks better of it. He takes his phone back out of his pocket.

 **LOUIS:** sorry lotts, lost track of time. will fly out tomorrow. Xx

It isn’t a lie but isn’t entirely true either.

Lottie texts back almost immediately.

 **LOTTIE:** we can talk when you get here. love you. Xx

A small smile tugs at Louis’ lips despite himself. Lottie knows him perhaps even better than he knows himself.

Louis pockets his phone once more and leans over to replace the cap on the Jack Daniels. He picks up the half-empty bottle—grimacing at how much he’s drank—and puts it into the balcony mini-fridge, making a mental note to tell the housekeeper to add another bottle to the shopping list. She’ll frown at him and mumble disdain in Spanish under her breath, but she’ll do it anyway.

He picks up what remains of his whiskey in his final glass and swirls the liquid around so the film growing on top disperses. He didn’t realize it’d been sitting out that long. He pauses with the glass in front of his lips, watching as the sun finally becomes just a crescent on the horizon. Louis thinks he should take a picture, send it to the group chat along with the memories of filming music videos well into the night. But then he thinks better of it. And even after that, his mind is drawn to Harry and how the pink on the skyline reminds Louis of the pink of his lips.

Shaking the thoughts from his head, Louis downs the rest of his drink, wincing as the taste burns on its way down his throat. Like seeing Harry, the Jack Daniels doesn’t burn like it used to, when drinking it was new and he wasn’t so dependent on the buzz, but there’s still a tinge of heat that will never go away no matter how hard he tries to drown in it.

>><<

_> >_ **_Don't Look Away_ ** _< <_

Louis’ ears don’t stop ringing after he steps off the plane. They don’t stop ringing in the car, even when he blasts music through his headphones as loud as they will go. They certainly don’t stop ringing when he goes to the girls’ house and they feign normalcy by eating a family meal at the long dining table with two empty chairs. They don’t stop ringing as Louis’ car pulls up outside the bar and he can still hear it even over the sound of his own heartbeat in his ears. 

Louis’ ears don’t stop ringing until he’s taken a seat at the bar, downed two shots of top shelf vodka back to back, and chased them both with chewing a maraschino cherry.

The cherries aren’t as effective at drowning out the burn of liquor as a lemon or a lime or even an orange slice, but he got into the habit after doing it once when a club was out of limes so he stuck his hand in the serving of the sweet red fruit and, after, Harry said it made his mouth taste like secondhand lollipops.

Some sort of soft pop song is playing over the speakers above the bar, but it clashes with the sound of the big TV in the corner. It flashes with what Louis thinks is highlights of the past year’s football matches, but Louis can’t quite make out the details because he never put his contacts in after getting off the plane and he’d rather not be caught out at a bar with his glasses on.

He's offered a free shot of Patron if he takes a selfie with the bartender, so he does, after convincing him not to post it anywhere until Louis leaves. The bartender agrees, saying he’d likely get in trouble if he got caught giving him the free liquor anyway.

A few patrons have caught on to who he is, or at least that he’s _somebody_ , but they either don’t care or don’t find Louis doing anything interesting enough to wonder what he’s doing here. The bar is a dive, a hole in the wall place that only locals frequent, and Louis has always felt safe here.

With the heat of the liquor thrumming through his body, Louis feels as though he is vibrating. He thinks he can feel his blood in his veins. He needs to move. He considers for a moment calling the car back to take him to a club so he can just fucking dance until he realizes that he’s not vibrating, his phone is. He pulls it out of his jeans’ back pocket to see it’s his dad calling him. He sucks his lip in, thinking for a moment, before silencing it and setting it on the bar in front of him.

“Can I get a whiskey?” Louis asks.

The bartender raises an eyebrow. But, despite knowing exactly who Louis is, doesn’t offer a response or a judgement. He just pours the dark liquid into a frosted glass over a single cube of ice and pushes it to slide in front of Louis.

Louis raises his drink in a silent _cheers_ to the bartender and takes a sip. It’s strong and earthy and burns on the way down, just the way he likes it.

Because he can’t make out the song coming out of the speakers and can’t see the fucking images on the TV, he resorts to staring at his phone. With the hand not holding the glass of whiskey, he picks up his phone and swipes it open. He scrolls through Twitter, liking some tweets here and there, until he gets fed up by the app and closes it. He does the same thing with Instagram. He gets onto his personal Facebook and sees that Anne has posted a photo with Harry and Gemma and one of Gemma’s friends. Louis’ met her but can’t for the life of him remember her name.

Louis can’t help the tug at the corner of his lips, threatening to spill out into a smile when he sees Harry. He’s sat at the end of the couch in Anne’s house, long legs spread out straight in front of him as if to show off his socks. Gemma’s tucked next to him, his arm around her shoulder, and her friend is leaning in next to her. Anne’s leaning over the three of them behind the couch and they’re all beaming at the camera. “Guess who popped in to visit!” Anne typed.

But as soon as the smile is there, it is gone, and in its place is a twinge of pain like plucking a note on the piano. At first it is sudden and hard, but then it mellows out and resonates. There’s something about the look on Harry’s face that makes Louis hurt. The absence of him wasn’t supposed to hurt like this.

Louis closes Facebook with one hand and finishes his whiskey with the other. He places his glass back on the bar and, almost by its own volition, the thumb on his phone opens his contacts and scrolls. Without even noticing, Louis makes it to the bottom of his contact list and hovers over Zayn’s name. He sucks air through his teeth, wondering how, after all this time, it was still in his muscle memory to talk to Zayn. He even clicks on the contact card, considering for a moment that he should send a message. Some sort of congratulations. But he knows as soon as he opens the messenger, he will see that the last message is one he drunkenly sent last year in a butchered apology to which he received no response.

So, Louis scrolls back up to find Liam’s name. But as soon as he is about to click the call icon, he remembers that Liam is still in LA and it’s sometime in the afternoon there and getting a mildly intoxicated call from Louis probably isn’t on his schedule. At the same time, though, he remembers that Niall is in Ireland.

He opens his messages to the lad and shoots him a quick text: “got time to talk rn? xx”

“Hey,” Louis flags the bartender down, pulling his wallet out. “I need to have a smoke but don’t fancy doing it out front, do you have a back door I can sneak out of?”

The bartender accepts the cash from Louis’ outstretched hand. “Someone you’re trying to avoid?”

Louis nearly laughs. _Something like that_ , he thinks. But all he says is: “Just want some privacy.”

The bartender shrugs, pointing with his thumb towards the exit door by the toilets.

“Cheers,” Louis says, replacing his wallet, “keep the change.”

Before the bartender can protest, he darts away from the bar and heads down the hallway. He’s already pulling out his lighter and his pack of cigarettes before he even makes it to the door.

Once outside, he leans against the brick wall, crinkling his nose at the smell of the trash, but when it mingles with the scent of tobacco, it doesn’t bother him so much. The night air is cool, the bricks against his back even cooler, and the sky’s stars twinkle faintly between the clouds. The brown fence across the alley from him is plastered in graffiti and a subconscious part of him remembers Zayn helping him learn to tag.

Louis’ phone vibrates against his ass and he tucks the cigarette between his teeth to replace the lighter to his pocket and pull out his phone.

 **NIALL HORAN** (and an awful picture of him at 16 that Louis found the first day he met Niall’s family at his childhood home) flashes on his screen.

He swipes to answer the call.

“Oi oi,” Louis answers customarily.

“Oi oi,” Niall returns, “what’s up, mate?”

“Nothing really,” Louis lies, “got into Doncaster today and just had a few drinks. Missed you, really.”

Niall laughs. “You didn’t ask to call because you missed me.”

“I do miss you,” Louis counters.

“What’s on your mind, Louis? Really. I have time. Me mates just left.”

Louis thinks for a moment. He isn’t entirely sure why he was so desperate to call someone. He could have called anyone else. It didn’t have to be someone from the band. But, it did. It always had to be. They’d all seen each other in their lowest lows and their highest highs, literally and figuratively.

“Is it Harry?” Niall asks.

And of course the bastard knows it is, but Louis can’t help the defensive feeling boiling inside of him right next to the lump that forms in his throat at the mention of Harry’s name. He’s so predictable. And he hates it. But Louis deflates.

“Yeah,” he says, taking a long drag of his cigarette.

“I saw Anne’s post.” Niall says. Louis swears he can read his mind.

“Do you think he’s miserable?” Louis almost adds _“like me?”_ at the end of it, but thinks better of it.

Their breakup wasn’t like a couple of divorced parents that tossed the children back and forth: Louis, Harry, Liam and Niall were all friends. But it’s a different type of friends now than they were when the band was still together. Louis and Harry didn’t make them choose a side, there aren’t sides. But the whole thing feels like a bridge and Louis’ on one side and Harry’s on the other, and Liam and Niall spend their time walking between the two. Sometimes the bridge is shorter, and Harry and Louis can talk to each other. Other times, they’re only separated by a few feet. But sometimes, times like these, the bridge is a mile long and Niall and Liam don’t have time to run and Harry’s got asthma and Louis is a drunk.

“He’s not miserable,” Niall says, and it feels like a punch to the gut, but his voice is gentle in Louis’ ear. “But you’re not miserable either, not always.”

Louis wants to protest, but knows Niall is right.

“He has days like this too,” Niall says, but Louis isn’t sure if he’s speaking from experience or just taking a shot in the dark to make him feel better.

“I know,” Louis says instead of voicing his thoughts, “I’m just drunk.”

“I know,” Niall echoes. Louis can hear the smile in his voice.

And as if it heard its cue, the liquor is already catching up to him because Louis blurts: “do you think it’ll be like this forever?”

“What?”

“This,” Louis gestures with his cigarette a stabbing motion, repeatedly hitting himself in the chest, before realizing Niall can’t see him. “This… the way it hurts, I guess.”

“I mean, I’m certainly no expert,” Niall replies. “But it feels better in time, yeah? Like, it doesn’t feel the way that it first did?”

Niall is right, again, but in a different way. The pain isn’t the same as it was those first few months. But Louis also can’t remember what it felt like. All he knows now is this dull ache that’s always just below his skin and bouncing between his ears. The ache he feels isn’t as immediate or excruciating as it was the day they decided to end it, but the longer the ending droned on, the longer the pain extended and flattened. Louis thought it would dissolve eventually: fade out into just a memory, but the only memories he has is of a time he felt more than just disappointment and yearning. He’d rather take all the pain all at once and never feel it again, but instead he is stuck with this persistent soreness that he can’t shake. He is like an open wound: it would heal if he would give it time, but all he does is pick and pick at it until it bleeds again.

“I don’t know,” Louis answers honestly.

“Do you think it’ll last?” Niall counters.

“What?”

“This breakup.”

The thought stops Louis entirely, a deep inhale of nicotine trapped in his lungs and the cigarette frozen in front of his lips. His mind simultaneously ceases to think and whirs at a thousand miles per second.

He never thought that it would last, but he also never thought that it wouldn’t.

“What do you mean?” the breath he had been holding comes out as a question and as a cough. He has to ask it again so Niall can hear him: “what do you mean?”

“I don’t know, Louis,” Niall says, and he sounds mildly exacerbated. “Have you even thought about that? About where this road leads, even?”

“No,” Louis answers as if it is obvious.

“It sounds as if you haven’t come to terms with a thousand things,” Niall surmises. And he is right. “Maybe you need to work that out before you decide if you’re going to have to suffer forever.”

“When did you get so smart?” Louis mutters.

“It’s all the songwriting with women for a change,” Niall fires back.

Louis can’t help the chuckle that erupts from him. “Alright, alright.”

“Do you feel better?” Niall asks.

“Yes,” Louis answers. And he does.

He and Niall exchange a few unimportant updates before Louis finally lets Niall go.

“I’ll see you soon,” Niall assures before he hangs up.

Before pocketing his phone, Louis sends Niall: “thanks for the chat, appreciate ya xx”

Niall types back a speedy: “anytime, mate”

Louis drops his spent cigarette to the ground, smashing the embers out with his foot as he places his phone back in his back pocket. He pulls his hood over his head and tucks his hands into the sleeves of the hoodie. He’s a little turned around in the alley and looks both ways before deciding to make his journey to the right. For a reason even Louis can’t decipher, he decides he’s going to walk all the way back to his dad’s house; just him and the moon.

And in his head are lyrics to a song he hasn’t started yet about a boy he’s always loved and a feeling he can’t remember.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you everyone for reading, leave kudos and/or comments if you liked it. Will hopefully be updating soon.


	2. Won't Let Go of Your Hold on Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Louis’ heart is in his throat, there’s no doubt about it. His heart has launched from behind his ribs and lodged itself into his throat and if Louis had it in him to gag, his heart would spill out onto the studio floor and he’d die there heartless and alone with Harry’s breath in his ear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Song of the Chapter: Kill My Mind
> 
> DISCLAIMER: This story is fiction (obviously). Never happened. Though this is based on real people, this story does not reflect them or their reality in the slightest.

**June 2019**

_> > **Ease the Pain** < <_

Louis never gets used to being on talk shows by himself. Not that he’s alone, but it feels strange to be bombarded with personal and professional questions without the presence of three or four other blokes equally as uncomfortable with the microscope analyzing them. During filming, he finds himself yearning to turn his head or gaze out the corner of his eye and see a tall curly-headed lad dressed in black already peering at him; nose scrunched trying to hide a smile and green eyes seeing only him.

James knows how uncomfortable Louis is. He’s always been kind to him, despite his overwhelming façade of douche-y-ness that comes with being a talk show host, but Louis is convinced it’s only because he adores Harry. Not that Louis blames him anyway, Harry is easy to adore. But there’s always this lingering presence of unanswered questions: ones he wants to ask James, and ones James wants to ask him.

But it doesn’t end up being James that asks him.

During a break in filming, after Louis has excused himself to go to the loo and the others have taken to the green room to munch on the luscious spread of snacks James’ staff always provides, Sir Ian McKellen stops him in the hallway.

“Louis?” His voice is kind, soft, but still with the gravitas of a successful man wise beyond his years. Louis’ name coming from the man’s mouth still feels bizarre, despite it happening all day. But it’s different this time. There’s a certain weight to it, a question behind it that goes beyond him trying to get Louis’ attention.

“Yes?” Louis coughs out his reply, his heart swelling as he has a momentary crippling realization that this is his life and not a dream; where celebrities he’s looked up to since he was a child address him as if they are long-time friends.

The actor wastes no time, opting instead to haul out all of Louis’ dirty laundry in the brightly lit hallway of the Late Show’s studio: “that lad that you were close with when we were last on a show together…” he starts.

Louis feels a lump push its way into his throat—as if the “we” from the Graham Norton show at the height of One Direction’s success could be anyone other than him and Harry, than _louisandharry_ —but he swallows it down and lets the awestruck wonder leap into his head instead; Sir Ian McKellen and Louis being the “ _we_.”

“On the Graham Norton show,” he says, as if Louis doesn’t already know exactly what he’s talking about, “the one lad that you were glued to the hip with.” Louis is nearly amused. They both know damn well he knows his name. Harry adored meeting him, and even if Ian was being a little facetious with his similar adoration of their band and of Harry, it still made Harry blush and swell with pride.

“Harry,” Louis says slowly, cautiously.

“Ah, yes,” he replies, waving his hand as if it was a great realization, but the tone of his voice reveals that he did indeed remember his name, “Harry Styles.”

The name lingers in the air, hovering between them with this unspoken meaning. In 2014, Louis didn’t have to tell Sir Ian McKellen that he loved Harry. He figured it out on his own. They both chalked it up to him being gay as well, being able to tell just from the magnetized air between the two lads, but Louis knows that it was obvious to anyone who looked close enough at them, gay or not, that they were in love. In a similar fashion, the actor had lightheartedly cornered the two of them outside of the toilets after filming. In a long-winded conversation with much more fanfare than what is currently occurring, Sir Ian McKellen had asked them the nature of their relationship. Louis had opened his mouth, ready to spit lies between his teeth like always, but Harry had blurted it out like it had been bubbling under his tongue the whole time. Louis had looked at him sideways, eyes widening and wondering what the fuck they were going to do now. But Ian had in no certain terms told them their secret was safe with him. He understood. Even being an out and proud gay man in the industry, he still understood the pressures they were under and the threats they faced if anything came to the surface.

“Don’t let anyone tell you what they’re doing to you is right,” he had said. “It may be necessary to salvage the reputations of elite businessmen who sign your cheques, but don’t let them tell you it’s right.”

Harry had cried later that night. The torn piece of paper that Ian had autographed, along with simply the word “strong” was probably still in his wallet, flimsy and worn from the amount of times Harry has taken it out to gaze at it and rub between his fingers like a good luck charm.

“Yes. . . Harry Styles,” Louis repeats, and he can’t help the way the name catches on his tongue.

Again, the actor wastes no time, blurting out simply: “Are you still in contact with him?”

Louis is bewildered, despite predicting exactly the way this conversation was going to go. “Yes?” he answers like it’s a question. “Kind of.” He starts to stammer over his words like he always does when Harry is brought up and he doesn’t have a script memorized in his head. “We’re not… together. Anymore. We’re… it’s…” Louis bites his lip. Part of him knows that Sir Ian McKellen doesn’t care in the sense that Louis hopes he does. But the honesty he showed them years ago deserves to be returned with the same honesty. “We broke up. When the band did. After a few months, actually, I guess. We… it didn’t…”

Ian rescues him from his own mouth, holding up one hand to stop him and the other coming up to grip his shoulder in comfort. “It’s alright, lad, you don’t need to explain the gritty details.” He moves his raised hand to grip his other shoulder, lowering his head a bit so him and Louis are eye to eye. “I have to admit I was curious, but only because you seem a vastly different person than the one I met those years ago. Not that I expected you to be the same, per say, but it was a different that I didn’t expect. I had my suspicions.”

Louis wants to say that he hit the nail on the head, that he feels an entirely different person without the weight of even the invisible presence of his love for Harry, but the truth is that it is still there, there’s just nowhere for it to go, so it bleeds into the core of his identity. When they were together, it was easy for him to separate and shift from _louisandharry_ Louis to public Louis and even to family Louis, the multitudes of his personalities all felt like different people. But without _louisandharry_ , that part of Louis had nowhere to go but meld into the other versions of himself.

But all Louis says is: “yeah.”

Ian just looks at him, letting his eyes search for the answers on Louis’ face that he won’t articulate, and, after a few moments, drops his hands to his side again and straightens up. “I hope you’re doing alright,” he says, “or as alright as you can be.”

“I am.” Louis doesn’t know if it’s the truth, but somehow it feels honest.

The actor looks as if he’s about to step away, staring at something behind Louis’ head, but he turns his attention back to him. The kindness in his eyes seeps under Louis’ skin and he feels like he could melt from it. The people that know the most intimate parts of him and are still somehow forgiving of his cold exterior always make him feel more himself than the people he’s with every day.

“Don’t let anyone take every bit of you away,” Ian says softly, “it’s going to feel every day like this world is chipping at you until there’s nothing of you left, but don’t let it happen.”

Louis wants to say that he isn’t sure who he is anymore because there’s no one there to remind him of his truths because there was only two people who knew him as honestly as he knew himself and one is dead and he’s pretty sure the other isn’t in love with him anymore.

But Louis chokes down the tears and plasters a small bittersweet smile to his face. “Thank you.”

Ian searches his face again, likely finding the lies Louis is hiding there, but he must understand too much because he simply returns the smile and walks past him back down the hallway.

Louis stands where he’s abandoned: left with his fears and the truths he’s too scared to face but instead of falling into a sizzling heap of wounded dignity and heart wrenching despair, he pulls his phone out of his pocket, scrolls to Harry’s contact and sends: “Sir Ian McKellen says hello.”

>><<

_> > **Raise My Body Back to Life** < <_

Louis’ pulling papers out of his tattered journal wondering where the fuck he wrote the edited chorus he thought of when his assistant Carlos tumbles into the studio Louis and his band are currently occupying, hair disheveled and breathing heavy like he’s run the distance between the studio and the front desk three times.

Michael looks up from the tune he’d been fiddling with, guitar pick sticking out of his mouth like a plastic tongue, Matt drops his pencil when the door slams back against the wall mumbling cruses under his breath, and even Steve, who looked about ready to fall asleep he was so hungover, jolts his eyes open to gaze at the intruder.

Carlos just stares at them, all frozen in their positions like time itself has stopped.

“Carlos?” Louis tries, “all good, bub?”

Carlos blinks and then appears to shake himself awake. “Um,” he starts.

“You’re not interrupting,” Louis assures him, “promise. What’s up?”

“I’m sorry,” Carlos apologizes anyway. But he doesn’t continue, opting instead to stare dumbfounded at Louis.

Louis can’t help it when his eyebrows raise, the corner of his lip quirking in both amusement and frustration. “Spit it out, man, you look like you’ve seen a ghost; must be important.”

Carlos glances at the other lads in the room, then through the glass at the sound engineers in the booth who look equally as confused, before turning his gaze back to Louis.

“Uh,” he says again. “There’s a uh… there’s a phone call for you. At the desk,” he sputters.

Louis just gapes at him. He narrows his eyes and cocks his head, still just as confused as when Carlos barged in like the apocalypse had started. “Can I take it later? We’re taking a break here in about an hour or so.” If they had called the studio, whoever it was likely didn’t have Louis’ personal phone number and so Louis likely didn’t want to take the call at all, but that would be horribly impolite.

“Um,” Carlos says again, eyes darting around the room once more, “no?”

This time, Louis raises his chin simultaneously in disbelief and amusement; he can’t tell if Carlos is being serious or not.

“It’s important,” Carlos adds sheepishly.

Louis stares for a few moments before sighing, turning to look at his band who each shrug in unison, aside from Steve, who had apparently already decided this conversation wasn’t worth his time and has resumed his position of leaning his head against the sound absorbing panels with his eyes closed. He glances through the glass at the mixing booth and the engineers both still look bewildered, but Sam gives him a hesitant thumbs up, letting him know he’d be fine to take the call if he wanted.

“Okay,” Louis sighs and he drops the journal back on top of the piano, stepping over the mess of cords to follow Carlos out of the studio and into the hallway.

Carlos doesn’t reveal any more information on their walk to the desk, though Louis notices he is walking quicker than usual and appears to be buzzing under his skin. Louis wants to stop and ask him what the fuck is wrong with him but is too afraid of Carlos quitting after last week’s incident of Louis blowing up at him when a couple of paps slipped into the studio under the guise of an interview for a non-existent award Louis had “won.” Carlos is a bit too gullible for the task of being an international boyband sensation’s assistant, but the boy is kind and organized and, most importantly, forgiving, and it’s all Louis can really ask for; he likes him.

When they get to the entryway, the light from outside streaming in to light up the circle desk, Carlos stops in the hallway. Louis makes a few steps past him, before turning, giving him yet another confused look. Carlos points, and Louis follows his finger to see the landline phone off the hook. When he turns back to look at Carlos again, the lad has turned his back and is walking back down the hallway.

Louis raises his eyebrows after him but sighs and turns to the desk, taking several strides to stand beside the desk. He reaches down and grips the phone his hand, putting it to his ear while using the other to take the call off hold.

“This is Louis.”

There’s no sound in the earpiece at first, just static (that could also be Louis’ tinnitus), and he almost laughs, reconsidering for a moment Carlos’ employment if he’s pulled him out of a writing session for a prank call. But, then, there’s a click that notes Louis has similarly been taken off mute and then some fumbling on the other side before vaguely familiar breath fills his ears.

“Erm, Lou?” There’s a deep breath in his ear again, but Louis swears time has stopped. “Louis?”

Louis’ heart is in his throat, there’s no doubt about it. His heart has launched from behind his ribs and lodged itself into his throat and if Louis had it in him to gag, his heart would spill out onto the studio floor and he’d die there heartless and alone with Harry’s breath in his ear.

“Harry?” Louis whispers and he can’t help the way he chokes on his name, the way it sounds like he’s breathing new life into a love he’d thought long since passed, but Harry’s name passes his lips and falls from his tongue like he’s spoken the man into existence.

“Yeah, Louis,” Harry says and it’s all low and secret like he isn’t sure why he’s calling him.

Louis forgets for a moment the millions of unsaid things between them, wants to ask Harry to say his name again, but at the same time the weight of this phone call hits him, he’s wondering why it’s happening, why it’s on the studio’s phone, and he can’t help the sudden fear that either someone has died or it’s Harry’s turn to announce that he has to participate in a wildly over-complex scheme in order to preserve his heterosexual facade.

“Is everything okay? Is something wrong?” Louis hurries the questions out so fast he trips over his words, has to say them again slower when Harry tells him he couldn’t understand him.

“Everything’s fine,” Harry assures him in his calming voice dripping in silky sweetness. Louis could sink into it if he tried. But the assurance only lasts so long before Harry’s voice is back to one that resembles professionalism; like he isn’t talking to the man he could ask to jump, and Louis would counter with _“how high?”_

“I, uh,” Harry starts, and Louis can tell he’s controlling his tone the same way Louis controls his own on camera: not wanting to reveal the emotions behind the words. Louis can picture him running his hand through his hair to quell his discomfort. For a split-second, Louis wonders how long it’s gotten.

“I was calling your mobile, but you weren’t picking up,” Harry says. “At first, I got worried you weren’t picking up because it was me, but then… I, uh,” he pauses again, then rushes out all at once: “remembered how you only don’t pick up your phone if you’re in the studio, so I’d figure I’d try.”

“But everything’s okay?” Louis asks

“Yes,” Harry assures again. “I just—”

“Wait,” Louis interrupts, biting his lip, knowing how much Harry doesn’t like being cut off, but it’s too important. “Do you mind if I call you back?”

Harry inhales and Louis can almost hear the confusion. “What?”

“On my mobile,” Louis explains. It’s his turn to sound sheepish and run his hand through his hair. “The, uh, the label monitors these calls. Records them. It’s for safety or summat but I, uh, I don’t want…” Louis trails off. He doesn’t need to explain.

“Oh,” Harry says, recognition plain in his voice. “Oh, yeah, erm… I’ll be here.”

“Okay,” Louis breathes, “don’t go anywhere.”

“You know I won’t.”

The soft statement catches Louis by surprise, but he doesn’t let it linger in the air or in his mind for long before he’s slamming the phone down, whirling on his heel and galloping back down the hallway to the studio.

He slams into the sound booth with the similar urgency Carlos had busted in with, the guilty party now sitting at the corner of the mixing table, looking at him with a knowing smile.

“Who—?” Sam starts, but doesn’t finish as he watches Louis scramble in his jacket pockets for his mobile.

Louis can feel all the eyes on him, and they feel more penetrating than any sort of audience on a talk show. He knows he’s being far too transparent and all of these people who have spent more than the last year with him must know by now who was on the phone call, even though he is one thousand percent sure Carlos would not have shared.

He hears Benji give a soft, knowing “oh” from in between Sam and Carlos as Louis yanks the booth door open to exit and he can’t help but shove an accusatory middle finger in his direction as he darts back out the door. He hears an answering laugh just as Sam starts to speak into the microphone to his band: “go ahead and take 5, Louis is….”

Louis makes it to the roof in record time, taking the stairs two at a time, and by the time he’s pacing outside, scrolling to Harry’s name in his phone, he’s out of breath. He wonders if this is how asthmatic Harry feels all the time, where breath is just out of reach. It’s somehow thrilling.

Hovering his thumb over Harry’s contact card, seeing he has three missed calls from him, Louis allows himself to catch his breath. He doesn’t have any sort of façade with Harry, doesn’t need to; Harry has always been able to read him like a large print picture book, even over the phone. But Louis still has his dignity. Or, at least, some of it.

When he makes the call, the phone rings twice before Harry picks up.

“Hello,” he rasps into the phone, less a greeting and more of a statement.

This time, Louis lets himself get wrapped up in Harry’s voice. He closes his eyes and tilts his head back and lets his words float over him like clouds of smoke engulfing him in a hug.

“Are we safe now?” Harry jokes.

“Yeah,” Louis breathes.

In the pause, the air is weighed down by both things said and unsaid. The silence stretches into a metaphor of their relationship the past few years; something that is there but not really there, that they won’t speak about but will sing about, something that tears Louis’ hearts to shreds but also threads it back together again.

“Still there?” Louis breaks the silence. _“Haz”_ is on the tip of his tongue, but he bites it back.

“Yeah.”

But there’s another pause, the phone line filled with their breathing. But Louis doesn’t let the silence have meaning this time.

“Why’d you call, Harry?” It isn’t meant to come out like a soft accusation from a wounded lover tired of being avoided, but it does. And Harry feels it because he sucks a sigh into his lungs before heaving it out.

“Nine years next month,” he says simply. He doesn’t let the question bother him. Louis respects him for that.

“Yeah,” Louis says. It was always lingering in the back of his mind, but he would be lying if he said he hadn’t forgotten. In forcing himself to forget Harry, he inevitably forced everything they were apart of out of his brain too. As much as he tries to fight it, the One Direction phase of his life is as intertwined with the Harry phase of his life as his love for Harry is intertwined with his very being. And forgetting Harry came with forgetting himself and forgetting his history too. So, he ignores the pain shooting into his chest and says: “your year, yeah?”

When the band announced their hiatus after months of negotiation and years of consideration, the boys had decided it would only be fair if each anniversary was planned and hosted by one of them. It was a strategy to stay close while also honoring what brought them together but without putting the weight of it all on one person (though Liam would have absolutely volunteered to do it every year). First it was Louis in 2016 (because he had wanted to get his over with, but Harry did most of the planning then anyway), then Liam in 2017, Niall last year, and that left only Harry.

“Yeah,” Harry says.

“Is that…?”

“Yeah,” Harry says again, answering the question he knew Louis was asking, but perhaps not wanting to hear Louis say it: “ _is that the only reason you called me?_ ”

“I’ve got the whole week blocked off on my calendar,” Louis informs him, swallowing his emotions. “And by now everyone knows not to schedule anything that week anyway.”

“Okay,” Harry says. Louis thinks he’s going to explain further, but he doesn’t, he just breathes into the phone as if Louis is supposed to know just from the heaviness in the air.

“Do you need a copy of my passport for the plane tickets?” Louis offers. He’s still not entirely sure what’s happening. “We going to Ibiza or something, Styles? Should I unearth my beachwear?” Louis is joking but only because he wants to picture Harry’s dimpled smile on the other side of the phone.

But he isn’t smiling, Louis can tell.

“Lou,” Harry sighs and Louis nearly crumples at the nickname loaded with history, but Harry corrects himself quickly enough that it’s painful instead: “Louis.”

“What, Harry?” It comes out biting. He doesn’t mean it to.

“I was thinking of, actually, uh…” Harry trails off. Louis can tell he is biting his lip.

“Spit it out, mate.” Louis is actually getting frustrated. He usually has the patience for Harry’s meticulously planned thoughts and even slower speech, but he is so overwhelmed by the thoughts and feelings swirling around his head that he needs to go back downstairs, open the journal and vomit his feelings in the form of lyrics and melodies.

Harry sighs again. Louis bites back an exclamation of him not needing to call him if he isn’t even sure what he’s going to say. That isn’t fair. Louis never knows what he’s going to say to Harry. That’s part of the reason this phone call is happening like this anyway.

“I’ve been having trouble,” he starts again, “with being followed, paps and shit. It’s always like that when it comes close, but this year’s been worse because of, uh,” he coughs, “because everyone’s expecting us both to be releasing music soon.”

Louis thinks back to last week and how desperately the paps had tried to pry their way into his studio. “Yeah…” he urges Harry on.

He hears something brush the earpiece and Louis pictures Harry running a hand over his face like he always does when he’s uncomfortable and thinking of the best way to spit words out.

“So, I was thinking, erm…” he trails off again. But before Louis can open his mouth and articulate the eager sass gathering on his tongue, Harry finally spits out: “I was thinking we could go to my dad’s house.”

The idea stops Louis in his tracks. If he hadn’t already been gripping his phone so tight in his hands his knuckles were likely turning white, he would’ve dropped the device on the ground.

“Like old times,” Harry says, and he can’t fight the fondness evident in his voice, “it’d be private, no one would think to look there, the locals there have always been protective of us, and Jeff was saying we could even leak some fake information so the paps would be focused elsewhere. Do pap walks in Ibiza that weekend before meeting up.” Harry’s nervous, but Louis is barely listening, his mind spinning back to their first time at Harry’s dad’s house where Louis was so fucking gone for Harry by day two.

“I understand,” Louis opts to say so that Harry knows he’s been listening, but it comes out like a squeak.

“We don’t… we don’t have to,” Harry supplies, “I just thought… it might be, I dunno, safer that way. We could have privacy. It could just be us.” Louis can’t deny that the thought is appealing. But he also can’t ignore the heavy presence Des Styles’ house has always had in his life. As far as he’s concerned, it’s where he decided Harry was the one. But that was a lifetime ago and they’ve lived at least two lifetimes since, so Louis doesn’t know what it all _means_.

“If that’s what you want,” Louis says and he knows it’s not the right thing to say, but he isn’t sure what to say that won’t end up in Harry calling the whole thing off.

“Louis,” Harry sighs out. It’s his turn to be a little exacerbated. “If it’ll make you uncomfortable, we can really go to Ibiza or the Soho farmhouse like always, I just thought it’d be something different and under the radar. We’ve all been so busy and caught up that I think it’d be nice to slow down for awhile.”

Harry is right. And it does sound appealing. Having a low-key week with the boys and the people who formed his life so many years ago sounds a lot better than pretending they don’t all wish every day that they could take a break and leave it all behind, if not just for one week.

“No,” Louis admits, “it’s a good idea.”

Harry pauses. He must not have expected Louis to cave this fast, to not put up even a bit of a fight. But he must not know Louis as well as he once did because Harry could ask for them all to meet in the dumpster behind Simon Cowell’s house to celebrate and he’d be on a plane in a heartbeat.

“Really?” Harry asks.

“Just us or the whole crew?”

“I was thinking the lot of us for the first few days, but then just us the last couple. But it doesn’t have to be that way. The house can get pretty boring now.”

Louis’ dismissal is on the tip of his tongue, the smile hot on the heels, but then Harry’s taking another tentative inhale.

“Would, uh, would Eleanor be coming?”

As soon as the joy was there, it is gone, fizzled out by just one name. Louis wipes a hand over his face.

“Yeah,” he admits, “probably.”

Harry doesn’t respond. The silence lingers around them again, this time with a different weight to it, the weight inherently similar to the one that eventually tore them apart nearly three years ago.

“Okay,” Harry finally says.

“Yeah,” Louis repeats, voice small.

“So, uh,” Harry clears his throat, “you’re up for it, then?”

 _“Always”_ is on the tip of Louis’ tongue, but it would mean too much and be partially a lie, so he substitutes another: “yeah.”

“Okay,” Harry says, voice clipped. “That’s all I… uh, I just wanted to check. Before I made the plans.”

“Okay,” Louis repeats.

“I’ll send the plans in the group chat,” Harry says, as is customary. And Harry knows Louis knows he would do that, so for a moment Louis is able to convince himself that Harry simply doesn’t want to end their phone call.

“Yeah.” Louis is a broken record. “Okay.”

“Thank you, Louis,” Harry says and it’s like a whispered thought. Goosebumps erupt on Louis skin.

“Anytime, Harry,” he replies equally as soft.

“I’ll see you soon,” Harry affirms, voice back to the strange too-loud professional voice as if he’s pushing himself out of the softness he succumbs to whenever he speaks to Louis about the weighted emotions of their past. “Goodbye.”

Harry hangs up the phone before Louis can even open his mouth in a salutation. The line going dead stuns him so much that Louis pulls the phone away from his ear in confusion to check if Harry really did hang up on him.

“Louis?” The voice from behind him jolts him, too much swirling around in his head to be aware of anything happening in his physical vicinity.

He turns to face Carlos, who is now standing in the doorway to the roof. His face is neutral at first, then washed in a wave of concern. He takes a tentative step forward.

“Are you alright?”

Louis is confused until he feels a wet tear slide down his cheek and drop to the top of his pert lips. He hadn’t even realized they had been gathering under his eyelids.

“Yeah, yeah,” Louis dismisses, pocketing his phone and pressing both palms to his eyes to rub away any straggling tears. He’s more embarrassed than anything, his conversation with Harry forced to the back of his mind.

“Do you want me to ask the band to go home?” Carlos offers.

“No, no,” Louis dismisses again, stepping towards Carlos and dropping his hands. “More ready to write than I was before, honestly,” Louis half-heartedly jokes, sending a sheepish smile Carlos’ way.

But Carlos is becoming good at reading Louis, pausing for a moment before hesitantly asking: “are you sure?”

“Sure,” Louis says.

Carlos doesn’t seem convinced, but he turns anyway, holding the door open for Louis to step inside and journey back downstairs.

When he gets back into the studio, everyone has gathered in the recording room, even Benji and Sam looking up at him in surprise when he walks through the door. They’re all looking at him like they expect him to shatter into pieces if someone so much as mentions continuing the writing session. But Louis claps his hands to disperse the thoughts.

“All right,” he says, maybe a bit too loud so it sounds as if he’s also convincing himself, “let’s get back to work.”

There’s a pause where everyone seems to weigh the true meaning of Louis’s words, but when he steps to stand back alongside the piano and opens his journal, they start rustling back to their original positions.

Louis stares at the scribbled words in his journal, painfully aware it is the journal Harry gave him as a second thought, and suddenly realizes that the words are wrong, all wrong. Harry’s voice and the memories of how it all started are fresh in his mind and the bittersweet nostalgia is rushing through his veins like he’s injected the past into his body with a needle. He picks up his pen and what comes out in the ink is a song about not knowing anything but somehow knowing everything and being too young to understand that none of it even mattered.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Please leave kudos & comments and share if you liked it :) All my love, xx


	3. Everything I've Waited For

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He’s being cordial, like they’ve always been at these reunions, but something is different this time; something in the air is heavier, something between them sparkling and crackling like it did in the X-Factor toilets nine years ago.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Song of the Chapter: Too Young
> 
> DISCLAIMER: This story is fiction (obviously). Never happened. Though this is based on real people, this story does not reflect them or their reality in the slightest.

** July 2019 **

_> > **Everything’s Feeling Different Now** <<_

She doesn’t smell right. Everything else about draping his arm over Eleanor, Louis can get around: the way her bony shoulder digs into his armpit as she leans close to take a picture, how strangely dark her skin is compared to his, even her too-long hair when it gets stuck under his arm and slicked to his sweat-stained skin. But she just doesn’t _smell_ right.

If they were friends, he wouldn’t be so pressed. He could very well be in secondary school again, pretending to like girls with his best friend Bethany (who _actually_ liked girls) and feigning that they were dating so no one would catch on to them. If he and Eleanor had decided between the two of them that their “relationship” was for the best for Louis’ safety, he doesn’t think he’d have as much of a problem with it; he’s done it before. When he was closeted in school, he sucked off a guy from another school after a footie match and immediately (after rinsing with a swig of mouthwash like it was a shot of Hennessey) kissed Bethany on the cheek for the rest of their school to see with none the wiser. People from his hometown never knew; still don’t—he’s a champ at pretending.

But he didn’t decide this. He isn’t sure who did. He’s always believed it was Simon who proposed the idea, but he has no clue how he could have plucked Eleanor off the street unless she marched right up to the doors and volunteered herself to tie like an anchor to a clearly happily taken gay man in a boyband.

Eleanor Calder could give Simon Cowell a run for his money in the competition of greed and manipulation. She’s much less irritating to look at for extended periods of time, but the cogs turning in her brain behind her deceptively empty face work at a much faster, more punishing rate than Simon’s. She’s cleverer, callous, and more vengeful than anyone in the PR industry combined, but Simon’s got the money, the executive position, and the (blind, fame-hungry, and easily swindled at 18 years old) Louis. They feed off each other like giant New York City sewer rats; the fat ugly fuckers that Louis saw for the first time at 19 and nearly shat himself. Simon was Eleanor’s golden ticket to Instagram influencer (able to sit on her ass, pretend to be fucking someone, and still rake in as much money as a low-level Kardashian), and Eleanor was all Simon needed to protect this boyband image of raging heterosexual energy that drew the moneymaking teen girl audience. Louis would like to think that in another life he could’ve respected Eleanor’s hustle if she hadn’t been set on the path to fame by closeting by the King Closet-Case Himself, but he knows the maliciousness was not something introduced by Simon: it was always there, boiling under her skin.

But, right now, as she’s tucked into his side like some million-dollar accessory meant to preserve Louis’ masculinity, he isn’t thinking of how badly she’s tarnished his trust for people or how much control her perfectly manicured hands have over his life, all he can think of is: _she doesn’t smell right_.

His first thought is that she doesn’t smell like _Harry_ , but he pushes the thought away before it can grip his heart like a vice. It isn’t that she’s too feminine either; he cuddles his sisters all the time. She even wears the same perfume as Lottie, who he’d never point it out to because she’d be so terribly embarrassed. And Louis can admit that she smells objectively _pleasant_ —sweet, flowery—it just isn’t _right_.

They’re at the Soho Farmhouse. It’s the 21st, the day after Louis arrived and the first full day creating the illusion that the anniversary celebrations are occurring here. Eleanor’s contractually obligated to take as many photos and videos as she can to post the rest of the week while Louis is trapped in the house that arguably shaped the rest of his life with the man he’s still hopelessly in love with (and Niall and Liam). Louis’ already changed his outfit three times—Eleanor on her seventh—and, though he’s dreading the next several days and already writing at least four songs in his head, he wants nothing more than to unwind Eleanor’s dainty body from him and drown himself in the pool. Despite the vacation and resort determined to make him relax, he’s saturated in agony: his ears buzzing with Eleanor’s nails-on-chalkboard voice, he hasn’t had a smoke in hours, and his brain has so many thoughts running through it all at once that Louis thinks he might throw up his expensive lunch.

Before Louis can even attempt to throw up or, ideally, drown, the bungalow door slams open and with a gust of wind like Oxfordshire delivered him directly to this spot just to torment Louis, in walks Harry fucking Styles.

And Louis wants to drown even more.

He’s gorgeous—because of course he is, he always has been; even half-asleep, drunk, and puking in Louis’ YSL pants-clad lap in the back of a limo Louis had told him so—and the first thing Louis notices is that he’s growing out his hair again; he can tell even with Harry’s attention trained on the phone in his hand. It’s dark and curly and tousled from the wind, swept to the side from either the breeze or Harry playing with it. He doesn’t look like he’d just traveled all the way from LA for this stunt (likely because he was to be papped arriving at the Farmhouse): he’s got a sheer button-up on, the top several buttons left open to allow the swallows on his chest to see the world, and bright yellow fucking _bellbottoms_. And when he takes a few more steps into the bungalow, Louis sees he’s wearing white Vans with bright pink shoelaces.

Louis is glad Harry is either too distracted to see anyone else is nearby or so painfully ignorant of his surroundings that he can’t be bothered to look up, because it allows him to realize his mouth has dropped open and he’s able to snap it shut when Harry finally looks up.

“Oh.” The exclamation comes out of Harry like a breath; involuntary and soft. Harry freezes, mid-step, and must notice all at once that not only is he not alone, but his ex-boyfriend and his beard as well as his sister are all watching him enter.

Harry’s eyes meet Louis’, their green still as striking as he remembered, and then his gaze drifts to Louis’ arm draped over Eleanor’s shoulder.

Louis scrambles, despite himself, pulling his arm hastily up and over Eleanor’s body to rest by his side. He rises from the couch in one foul swoop and stands too quickly like an _idiot_ ; like he’s greeting fucking _royalty_.

He feels Lottie’s eyes trained on his back but the only gaze he cares about is Harry’s, whose eyes have followed his rising and are now examining him inquisitively with an eyebrow raised, the initial shock either passed or he’s so bewildered by Louis standing to greet him that he can’t fathom training his face to remain emotionless.

Louis opens his mouth to say something—anything—that will fill this tangible silence, but it isn’t him, it’s Eleanor.

“You’ve ruined the photo, Lou,” she whines, voice cutting the tension like a poorly timed knife. She’s exaggerating the nasal tone she knows he hates and speaking at a volume that indicates she wants everyone to know that she _doesn’t care_ about what’s happening in front of her.

But that isn’t what sets Louis off, it’s the nickname— _Harry’s_ nickname, the nickname that was always his nickname, but as soon as he was Harry’s and Harry said it was his favorite thing to call him, it _became_ Harry’s—like poison dripping from a snake’s teeth. It sends an unfamiliar wave of heartbreak careening into his stomach. He thinks he even sees Harry wince, his eyes darting to look past him at Eleanor, but as soon as the flash of emotion is across his face, it is gone.

Again, Louis opens his mouth, this time ready to either spit his own venom or say something so stupidly pathetic he’ll want to drown for the third time in the past 60 seconds—a new personal best—but, again, he is beaten.

This time, it is Gemma who interrupts him, tumbling through the bungalow door and, unlike Harry, sees the group already gathered and rushes forward without any sort of regard for her brother awkwardly standing in the middle of the room. Louis’ always adored Gemma.

“Louis!” She says cheerfully as she drops her duffel to the floor before invading his space and pulling him into a hug that he returns with ease.

Louis can’t help but melt into her; losing Harry’s family was almost as bad as losing Harry. He wonders if this is plain on his face, but it doesn’t matter because Harry isn’t even looking at him anymore. He’s surveying the bungalow they’ve been to several dozen times like it’s all brand-new, like nothing else interesting is happening around him.

Gemma uncurls herself from the embrace and moves behind him to squeeze Lottie too. She pointedly ignores Eleanor, opting instead to loudly gush to Lottie how long it’s been since she’s seen her face outside of a phone screen.

“I’m going to my room,” Eleanor snips. Louis imagines her nose is turned up in the air, expecting someone to glance her way, or ask her what’s wrong, but no one does. She knows better. No one in this room right now could give a single fuck what she’s got going on in between those pointed ears of hers. Louis hears her pretentious flip flops slap against the granite floor as she leaves. Louis doesn’t even move; he isn’t sure he knows how anymore.

“Harry,” he says, and he feels all of the weight rush from his body as it leaves his lips. Saying it feels as natural as breathing, but it has become so foreign on Louis’ tongue that he suddenly fears the world has turned upside down.

Harry turns his head to him as he does everything: slowly, carefully, and measured, as if he’s thinking about every imperceptible movement, every muscle that contracts as he turns.

Louis suddenly realizes he isn’t sure what to say. He’d started out with his name, surely that was a good place to start, but didn’t have any idea where to go from there. He’s still standing in the center of the room, stupidly waiting for something he isn’t even sure is coming: a greeting, a hug, a punch to the face?

“It’s good to see you,” Louis settles on. He hates it as soon as it is out of his mouth. Even he can hear all the words he _wants_ to say behind the phrase, but can’t or won’t and it’s no doubt Harry can hear them too. He’s being cordial, like they’ve always been at these reunions, but something is different this time; something in the air is heavier, something between them sparkling and crackling like it did in the X-Factor toilets nine years ago.

“Yeah,” Harry replies. His green eyes are boring holes into Louis’ body, his eyebrows narrowed. Louis thinks he sees Harry give him a once over: sliding his eyes from the top of his head down to his feet (that Louis suddenly self-consciously remembers are bare) until he meets his eyes again, but it happens so fast Louis is convinced he imagined it.

“You’re, uh . . . you weren’t supposed to get here yet.” Louis is sheepish, isn’t sure what to do with his hands. He wants to run them through his hair, but he also wants to pitch forward and either kiss Harry on the mouth or launch himself into the pool, which is looking more and more inviting with every passing second.

“Yeah,” Harry says again. He’s looking at him with an increasingly narrow gaze, likely seeing every thought that is passing through Louis’ mind. He’s always been good at reading Louis. But whatever is revealed on Louis’ face, he ignores, because Harry’s face morphs into an unfamiliar blasé. “Liam and Niall are both running late.”

“Of course they are,” Louis mutters. The corner of Harry’s mouth quirks up a bit as he tries to hide a smile. _Fuck yes_.

Louis is suddenly aware that the chattering behind him has faded and when he turns, sure enough, their sisters have disappeared, Lottie likely showing Gemma where she will be sleeping. Louis furrows his brows and looks down beside him, where Gemma’s abandoned bag is still sitting. _Definitely on purpose_. He tries not to think about it.

When Louis looks back up again, Harry’s eyes snap away from his to look out over the pool. His ears turn a bit pink and a similar warmth creeps up Louis’ neck and emblazes his cheeks. Harry was watching him. Louis tries not to think about that either.

“Do you know when they’ll get in?” Louis asks.

Harry looks at him, on purpose this time. “What?”

“Niall and Liam.”

“Oh.” Harry’s eyebrows twitch. Louis can’t figure out where his mind is at. _Infuriating_. “Liam within the hour, I think, Maya had some modeling thing to sort. Niall just left London. But I don’t think he has a reason.”

“Irish bastard,” Louis mutters under his breath. He isn’t sure if Harry hears him, but his lips twitch to suppress another smile.

“Well, erm,” Harry clears his throat, adjusting the duffel on his shoulder, and taking a tentative step forward. Unconsciously, Louis mirrors it with his own step back. “I’m gonna . . .”

“Oh, right!” Louis exclaims and takes a wide sideways step out of Harry’s way to clear a path to the bedrooms. He overshoots it, his calves hitting the couch and nearly loses his balance and topples back onto it. Harry raises an eyebrow. Louis feels like a fucking teenager.

Harry stoops down to grab Gemma’s bag as he walks, using the hand still clutching his phone like a lifeline to awkwardly salute him as a goodbye. Louis mirrors the motion, an uncomfortable half-smile stretched to his lips. He stays frozen with his hands balled into fists at his sides until he hears the door he assumes to be leading to Harry’s room for the night close.

As if his head is coming out from a drunken fog, Louis sighs so hard it makes him dizzy, buzzing his lips together. He rubs a hand over his face and flops unceremoniously back onto the couch. He stares at the blue water as it gently laps against the sides, wondering if he’d feel better if he jumped into the pool, thousand dollar outfit and all.

Louis can’t figure out why his body is thrumming, his heart pounding in his chest, the sides of his vision blacking out like he might faint. _It’s just Harry_. Not that there is anything _just_ about Harry, but he didn’t feel this way even during the anniversary celebrations the year after they broke up. He wonders if his heart and his body have had some sort of epiphany that hasn’t caught up to his brain yet.

Louis pulls out his phone, typing so furiously he has to re-write the text several times.

 **LOUIS:** Where the fuck are you???????

Niall replies in an instant.

 **NIALL:** Well it wouldn’t have done much good for me and payno to eavesdrop on your first time seeing him in a year, would it? ;) xx

Louis rubs another hand over his face, slapping his burning cheeks like it will make the blush disappear. He is acutely aware of how hard and fast his heart his beating, its tachycardia pounding in his ears until it drowns out even his thoughts. He is glad to have something to focus on other than the hurricane currently swirling in his brain and the strange, yet familiar yearning settling in his stomach, but he doesn’t know how much more of it he can take.

 _It’s only Harry, it’s only Harry, it’s only Harry_ , he chants to himself. But even his body betrays him, the butterflies in his abdomen starting up again tenfold. _It’s only Harry for three days in the place you fell in love with him_ , they tell him. And he may have once known Harry like the back of his hand, but Louis feels as though he’s going to re-learn him and end up falling in love all over again. But the immense pressure is already building up of his feelings for him, and if anymore appear, he knows he couldn’t take it—Louis can’t take anymore feelings for Harry. If even one more _thing_ (memory, feeling, or otherwise) works its way into Louis’ brain under the permanent category _Harry_ , his entire being will explode into a burst of light, lyrics, and a scent resembling the rosey cedar candle hidden in his closet.

But he’s already starting a song in his head, inhaling the lingering smell of Harry, and wondering how the fuck he’s going to survive the next three days.

>><<

_> > **Find Some Better Words to Say** <<_

The threshold of Des Styles’ house nine years later feels like some big fucking metaphor, but Louis doesn’t let himself think about it: he barges in first, racing past the other boys as they’re still pulling their luggage from their respective drivers. He even beats Harry, who’d sent his bodyguard, Gabe, in with the keys first to make sure his dad had, indeed, left (because, apparently, Des had wanted to stay to insure they didn’t destroy his property like last time, even though Harry assured him that they were all adults now; but a part of Louis also wondered if it was to save Louis the embarrassment of all of his father’s interrogations).

“I call the guest room,” Louis shrieks over his shoulder, though a part of him wants to see the look on Harry’s face if he’d claimed his childhood bedroom.

“Louis,” Harry calls after him, but he doesn’t wait to hear, continuing on his hurried quest to get inside the house before the feelings overwhelm him.

He marches the familiar path he’s walked too many times to count since that first time, always too polite to stay in Harry’s room when he visited, though everyone in the house knew damn well he’d sneak out every night and wrap himself around Harry anyway.

But when he reaches the room, he stops in the doorway. What once inhabited a dresser, a daybed, and a floor length mirror that was frustratingly taller than Louis, is a room that now appears to be an office.

He smells and feels Harry behind him before he hears him.

“Erm,” Harry says over his shoulder. “I tried to tell you. . . Dad turned it into his office.”

“I see,” Louis says, his voice weak and clipped. The feelings have caught up now, crashing over him like a tsunami wave; he couldn’t avoid them if he tried. “Couch, then?”

He’s staring at the room like he’s at a museum, taking in everything that is painfully _Styles_ , because he’s too scared to turn and look at Harry, to look at his face in this place that has so much meaning to him, to the both of them, to their relationship.

“Or Gemma’s,” Harry offers, “but—”

“I call Gemma’s room!” Liam calls, mocking Louis’ first claim as he rushes in the front door and sees Louis and Harry still standing in the no-longer-a-bedroom-room’s doorway.

Louis whirls around, Harry passing through his vision in a blur, so he doesn’t have to look at him. “Payno!” he yells and chases after Liam in a desperate attempt to have a room to himself.

Liam ends up with Gemma’s old bedroom, which still looks the same as Louis remembered, and that sends a strange feeling of comfort into his bloodstream. But Liam, in order to stake his claim on having a room to himself, went into great detail about how he’d promised to FaceTime Maya every night and he _“isn’t sure how it will go”_ and Louis had placed his hands over his ears, conceding that a man so sickeningly in love and still in the honeymoon phase of his relationship did, indeed, deserve the single bed.

Harry got his old room, of course, and though Niall had pretended to fight for it, Louis shot him the hardest death glare he could muster and he ceased his protest with a wink. The relief that flooded Louis was like no other. So, as opposed to what could have been him and Harry sleeping in the same room but not sharing a bed for the first time in _years_ , that left him and Niall on the couches. Which, he supposes, is fair, as they’re the only two who can fit on them horizontally anyway.

“What are we, teenage boys at a sleepover?” Louis teases, but the look Harry shoots him shuts him up. He knows how strange Harry feels about this, how bad he feels about the implications of staying here, but at the same time, Harry is desperate to have a good reunion with just the four of them and, even Louis can admit, this is the only place they can do it.

“Just like old times,” Louis finishes instead, and it gets a small smile out of Harry, his left dimple making a brief appearance. It causes the butterflies in his stomach to whirl up again, but he pushes them down.

They go to the George & Dragon, the pub they frequented their first time in Holmes Chapel, and even though Gabe is sat at a table nearby to keep watch, no one bothers them. Louis has always liked Holmes Chapel. Compared to when they’re in the larger cities where no one knows them personally, the places where each of them grew up have always been protective of them despite the fame. The people who watched Harry grow up, in particular, are overly respectful. But it’s impossible not to treat Harry like the angel he is. From both the family photos littering Des’ halls and the way Harry is greeted like an old friend by everyone on the street, Louis is gripped with the familiar feeling of wishing he’d met him sooner. When they arrive, Harry signs a few autographs and takes photos, but he doesn’t even have to ask them not to post them yet, they tell him themselves.

“We’ve missed you, lad,” one elderly patron says as she’s sat for dinner.

“Been awhile,” Harry admits to her, kissing her cheek.

When they sit, Harry leans over the table and whispers, “don’t even know who that is.”

Louis can’t help the smile that stretches over his face. _Always too kind_.

They sit and eat jovially, catching up and sharing stories they didn’t want to share in front of their families as the sun inches its way down the sky. The glass garden eating area gives them a perfect view and Louis interrupts their conversation to tell the boys to look at the sunset. Even Harry turns and, as Louis takes the opportunity to observe the back of his head and the way his curls have fluffed with the humidity, circled with a halo of orange and pink and yellow, Louis’ heart clenches. Harry’s the first to turn back to the table too, and, when he does, he meets Louis’ gaze, who drops his to his empty plate, a blush heating his cheeks. _God fucking dammit_. He feels like he’s 18 again, acting a fool because of a silly crush.

Harry pays for everything despite the chorus of protests from the rest of them.

“Didn’t realize this was a date,” Liam jokes and Louis chokes on the last gulp of his pint, sputtering so badly that Niall has to slap him hard on the back for good measure.

“Alright?” Niall asks him.

“Yep,” Louis says but it comes out a wheeze. He doesn’t look at Harry, though he feels his eyes on him, his ears flaming, and tries not to glare at Liam. Liam’s face is a mix of mischief and sheepishness, somehow knowing exactly what he did without at all intending to.

They play FIFA for hours that night, every now and then Harry interrupting to apologize they weren’t doing anything thrilling like the years before in Hawaii and Ibiza.

“Better than the Farmhouse,” Louis admits from the floor where he’s sat, more to himself than anyone, but Harry must hear him, because when Louis turns his head to glance at him, he’s raised his eyebrows.

“This is fucking awesome,” Niall says next to him, blessedly taking Harry’s attention away from Louis. “Yeah, I do this all the time, but it’s nice. . .” He trails off, pausing to score a goal and pump his fist in victory. “It’s nice to feel _normal_.”

“But—” Harry starts, but, this time, Louis shamelessly interrupts him.

“Harold,” he says firmly, ignoring the way Harry’s lips quirk up in a smile at the nickname, “we wouldn’t have agreed if we didn’t want to be here.”

“Yeah,” Liam joins in from the couch, a pout on his face as Niall scores _again_ , “it feels kinda cool to be back where it all started, you know, like we’re teenagers again.”

Liam’s inserted his foot into his mouth again (he’s always had a talent for that) and the air around them starts to feel heavy in unspoken truths. Niall glances at Louis out of the corner of his eye, but Louis concentrates on the screen in front of them despite the redness creeping up his neck for the millionth time.

“Normal,” Harry echoes, but it sounds like it’s unconscious. The back of Louis’ neck prickles and he thinks it’s because Harry might be looking at the back of his head from where he’s sat on the couch, but Louis just fiddles with his controller.

“Feels like a sleepover,” Liam agrees, oblivious to the way his words have changed the atmosphere, “like we’re just normal lads.”

“Except we’re in our mid to late 20s,” Niall jokes, and Louis is so relieved that Niall has taken the opportunity to dissolve the tension that he sighs.

“Yeah,” Louis laughs, “but we kinda skipped out on normalcy nine years ago.”

“Nine years,” Harry echoes and Louis is tempted to look at him, wondering why he’s just repeating what they’re saying, but he keeps his gaze trained on the TV.

“Nine years,” Niall repeats with a chuckle, shaking his head. “Fucking mental, that.”

Niall scores in the last ten seconds of the game, effectively winning the match for his and Louis’ team 11 to 2, Liam cursing and throwing his controller to the side. But he gets over his frustration quickly, picking up his beer and raising it in the air in a silent cheers.

“Here’s to being normal,” he says.

Louis and Niall laugh, picking up their own beers and turning to clink their bottles against Liam’s. Harry is motionless, staring blankly at the TV, his hands clutched into fists.

“Haz?” Louis questions, despite himself, but before he can swallow the worry and the nickname back down and correct it with Harry’s actual name, Harry’s eyes snap to his.

With Harry’s heated gaze comes the stirring up of the strange emotions inside of him. Louis works his jaw, clenching his teeth so hard it makes part of his brain ache, but he can’t tear his eyes from Harry like there’s something he wants to communicate to him just through an unwavering look.

Harry stares at Louis for a moment, then appears to shake himself and turns his attention to the rest of them, all with their beers still frozen together between them.

“Sorry, lads,” he mutters, and he stands, towering above Louis like a skyscraper. Louis can’t help but lean back so he can still look at his face, but he only finds Harry expressionless.

“’m tired, gonna go to bed.” Without another word, Harry steps behind Louis and over his scattered empty beer bottles and walks down the hallway to his room.

“Is he okay?” Louis murmurs to no one in particular.

“You know Harry,” Niall sighs.

Once Harry disappears from his view, Louis snaps his gaze to Niall. “What’s that supposed to mean?” It comes out more defensive than it’s meant to.

Niall and Liam share a knowing look, as if forgetting for a moment that Louis is desperately searching for answers that they clearly won’t give him. Liam’s eyes dart to Louis, then back to Niall again before taking a drink of his beer, staring at the bottle.

“He’s just. . .” Niall looks into his bottle too, swirling the liquid around to fill the space.

“What,” Louis more demands than asks.

“He’s in a weird spot, that’s all,” Niall explains, finally meeting Louis’ eyes. There’s something behind Niall’s gaze that Louis recognizes as familiar, but he can’t place it.

Louis knows that Niall and Liam won’t say anything more on the subject, and he wants to ask what it all means, but instead, he opts to turn his head and stare down the hallway after Harry, imagining, for whatever reason, that Harry is looking back down the hallway too.

He hates feeling in the dark when it comes to Harry. He should be used to it by now, it’s been nearly three years since Louis stopped being the first person Harry came to, but it never occurred to him that he went to Niall and Liam the same way Louis did. Despite himself, Louis wonders how much he’s told them, if its anywhere close to how much Louis has told them, and if between Niall and Liam they could mediate some sort of patchwork for them. But he’d never ask that of his friends and certainly not of Harry. Not here, not now, not. . . _after_. For the hundredth time in the past 48 hours, something settles in Louis’ stomach that he can’t quite place: a feeling that’s somewhere between nostalgia, pain, and longing.

>><<

_> > **Before I Let This Moment Slip Away** <<_

Louis wakes from a fitful night of sleep to the sound of sizzling oil and the scent of roasting potatoes. He doesn’t even open his eyes before the ache in his head that always comes with drinking far too many beers is prodding its way into his consciousness. He groans, sitting up and immediately regretting it, nausea gripping his stomach from the lack of proper food and water.

The first thing Louis notices is that Niall’s couch is abandoned, the blanket he’d used all disheveled at the end of the cushions. The second thing he notices coincides with what woke him up in the first place: Harry is cooking in the kitchen, just beyond the couch Louis is currently occupying.

He glances towards the door, seeing that not only has Niall abandoned him, but the lack of Liam’s trainers shows that Liam has too.

“Fuck,” he mutters under his breath, rubbing his eyes with the palms of his hand.

Louis doesn’t say it quietly enough, apparently, because once he’s effectively rubbed the sleep from his vision, Harry is standing at the hob, spatula in hand, and staring at him.

“Niall’s run to the bakery for sweets,” he says as if he heard Louis’ unspoken question. “Liam’s gone for a run.”

“Why?” Louis groans, disdain slipping into his voice, but he can’t let Harry know that he suddenly wishes to kick the other two band members in the balls for leaving the two of them alone in this fucking house. “Who the fuck goes for a run on vacation?”

Harry looks at him, hip and eyebrow cocked, before shrugging and turning back to the potatoes. “Dunno. Liam, I guess.”

Louis flops back onto the couch, draping an arm over his face and groaning again. He feels like death. He’s felt like death before, but hasn’t front of Harry for a long time.

“I’m making breakfast,” Harry offers. Louis scrunches up his nose. Harry’s always been a morning person, wanting to have full fucking conversations before the sun’s even all the way above the horizon. _Chipper before the birds have even started chirping_ , Louis’ mother used to say.

“Can see that, Harry” Louis says, “thanks.” He knows there’s a bite to his words, frustration built up from his uncomfortable sleeping place, his early morning, and the fact that his two mates who both know damn well the predicament he’s in have both abandoned him.

He pulls the arm over his face to stare at the ceiling. He can feel Harry’s pout. He sits up again and, sure enough, in the kitchen, Harry is scowling into the pan.

“It’s great, Harry, really,” he says stupidly, “I’m sorry. Just. . . haven’t had that many beers in a while. Rough morning.”

Harry looks at him, pout gone, but eyebrow raised again. “You haven’t been drinking?”

Louis laughs, loud and short. “No, no, not at all, ‘ve been drinking,” he says with a pained smile, “just not, like . . . beers.” The way he ends his sentence makes it sound like he’s going to continue, but he lets it hang in the air.

This time, Harry’s eyebrows furrow in confusion, trying to sort out Louis’ words.

And, like Harry’s presence has always been able to do, the honesty spills out of Louis’ mouth before he can consult his brain: “I drink mostly hard stuff; Vodka, Jack Daniels, Hennessey sometimes. . . that kind of thing. Hangover isn’t as bad with hard liquor. Doesn’t take as much to. . .” he trails off again.

Harry’s looking at him curiously.

But Louis keeps going: “Tequila, sometimes too, but I don’t like the taste. Have to be in the mood for it.” He’s rambling, but he’s able to suck the words back in before he says, “ _I still eat a cherry after tequila, because you liked it once._ ”

The blatant confusion is back on Harry’s face, his lips stuck out in a pout again too. Louis can’t help the way his glance darts to them. He tells himself it’s because he’s in Des Styles’ house, hungover from beers and seeing Harry for the first time, cooking no less, in years, but one look at Harry’s tongue darting out to swipe over his lips as he thinks has a heat swirling down in Louis’ groin.

But, luckily, Harry turns back to the potatoes once more. “Thought you didn’t like Jack Daniels.” He says it soft, injured, like he can’t help it.

The small phrase surprises him almost as much as it surprises Harry, who Louis sees wince after he says it. And Louis can’t have that, he can’t have Harry embarrassed or close back up again because Louis wants the honesty, he _craves_ it, so he counters with his own.

“I didn’t,” he says softly, “when we were . . .” he trails off, he doesn’t need to say it. “It’s an acquired taste. That I acquired.” He sucks in a breath. “After.”

At the word loaded with meaning, the tendon in Harry’s neck pops out as he swallows tersely, tension rigid in his back. Louis is struck by the sudden urge to press a kiss there and the thought nearly buckles him in half, takes him off the couch.

Louis finally stands, realizing it’s so silly to have this conversation across the room from each other, like they’re passing notes in primary school and not two adult men in tune with their emotions, but when Louis makes his way into the kitchen, Harry coughs and stands upright, tension still present in his body but the vulnerability closed like he’s just flipped a switch. Louis realizes with a sudden wave of confusion that he doesn’t know this cold, unfeeling person in front of him; it’s a Harry he’s never met before.

“Eggs are already on the table,” Harry says, and his tone has that professional quality to it that seeps into Louis bones and makes him crumple. “Potatoes will be done soon.”

Louis looks between Harry’s profile and the platter at the table, going back and forth several times until he resigns with a sigh. “I take it Niall was expecting donuts or pancakes or sommat?” Louis passes Harry, allowing himself a soft inhale of his scent that he hopes Harry doesn’t notice.

Harry lets out a tense chuckle, but Louis can already tell that the welcomed subject change is relaxing him. “Yep,” he says, popping the “p” as he plates some potatoes. “And when I said pancakes are tomorrow, he asked, ‘what about today?’ and apparently this wasn’t good enough, so he’s gone to the bakery.”

“This is more than good enough,” Louis assures as he sits at the table, side stepping the spot he used to sit in, but when Harry looks over at him, it doesn’t appear to be significant in his mind. “Thank you, Harry.”

The corner of Harry’s mouth stretches, and the left dimple carves its way into his cheek as he breaks out into a small smile. He seems to swell with the praise, eyes shining, and Louis is suddenly struck with all the mornings they’ve had this exact interaction: Louis sat at the table and Harry cooking for them. But just as soon as the memory is about to affix itself on his tongue to be spoken aloud, the front door tumbles open with a loud slam.

“I’ve brought sweets,” an Irish accent booms, “and look who I found just up the street.”

“Nearly ran me over,” Liam announces as he enters the house behind Niall. “If we weren’t already on hiatus, I’d leave the band.”

Niall cackles at that, it having been a long time since that joke had last been made, and Harry and Louis meet eyes again as the other two boys join Louis at the table. Louis smiles at him, heart filling with the same feeling he used to have every morning waking up with his best mates, and Harry must be thinking the same thing because he smiles back, all warmth and light and dimples.

><

It isn’t Harry who suggests the bonfire that night, despite his only mission seeming to be recreating their first experiences as a group at his dad’s house. He’d taken them to all the places they’d been before, including the nature hike in which Louis wore the wrong shoes and ended with a blister and a permanent ache in his ankles. “ _Didn’t that happen last time?_ ” Liam chided in his work boots. Louis had smacked him in the back of the head, but just smiled wide at Harry and told him it was a good idea.

“We should have a fire,” Niall says, clapping his hands together. “Like last time.”

Louis’ eyes pop open from where he’s collapsed on his sofa-bed. He scowls at the ceiling. “No more beer.”

“Sick,” Niall cheers in victory, taking Louis’ lack of protest as confirmation. “Got some vodka and some gin,” he offers.

“Gin?” Louis makes a face.

“I _love_ gin,” Harry says at the same time.

Louis sucks in a breath. Niall pops his head over the back of the couch to hover over Louis’ face. He’s got a stupid smile stuck to his lips that says _keep accidentally insulting your ex-boyfriend, I dare you._

“Gin,” Niall says again.

“Anything else?” Louis asks, but the embarrassment is plain in his voice. He thinks he hears Harry snicker.

“Redbull, Tommo, duh,” Niall says, presenting one of the cans as proof, “and tonic water and vermouth.”

Louis opens his mouth to say something snarky, but Harry must come over from where he was washing dishes in the kitchen, his voice much closer as he exclaims: “I could make martinis!”

This time, Liam laughs from his place on the other couch. “Martinis?”

“And s’mores,” Niall adds.

“Jesus Christ,” Louis mumbles.

But as his friends tumble out the door toward the fire pit a ways outside of Des’ garden, loud laughter echoing around him, he clambers off the couch and follows them.

Several jokes are cracked by everyone that Louis should do the fire starting, which results in him pelting everyone with marshmallows.

“Come on,” Liam pretends to whine, “we’re adults, Lou.”

“Thought we were being _normal teenage lads_ ,” Louis teases.

“If we were being our teenage selves,” Niall starts, a glint of mischief in his eye, but Louis doesn’t give him the chance to finish the thought, shoving a marshmallow directly into his open, laughing mouth. Niall flicks up his middle finger, which Louis returns.

It is Harry that gets the fire started just as the sun has sunk below the horizon. The temperature has cooled significantly, so after Louis picks up the abandoned marshmallows and tosses them in the fire to burn, he tucks his hands into the sleeves of his hoodie. Harry complains, whining something about making the wood sticky, but they both pretend not to hear it.

Harry does make martinis, he makes a mean one at that, and Louis is tempted to ask where he learned, but suspects that it was Nick Grimshaw, who’d always had a martini in hand whenever he went out with them. And Louis would rather not hear about the flamboyant _friend-of-Harry’s_ right now. Grimmy had practically crucified him when they broke up. He can’t help but wonder if Harry’d finally let Grimmy fuck him, because the man was clearly desperate to even after he knew he loved Louis, but the thought makes him so sick he is eager to push it out of his brain.

They’re all moderately tipsy with chocolate and marshmallow congealed under their fingernails from their poor s’mores-manship when Niall goes inside and returns moments later with his guitar.

“Is this a joke?” Louis deadpans.

“Just like last time,” he chortles.

Harry laughs loud and when they all turn to look at him, a little surprised, a sheepish grin stretches over his face and a blush heats his cheeks that Louis can see even with the only light being the fire in front of them.

“Sorry,” he mumbles, but he’s still got the drunk, goofy smile on his face.

Louis suppresses his own smile, wanting to open his mouth and tell him never to apologize for laughing, but Niall starts slowly strumming a tune Louis recognizes as _Olivia_ , so he just lets them sit in the silence of the music, no words necessary.

Harry turns his head to the sky, watching the stars and, after a moment, Louis does too. There’s so much more out here that he can see compared to London and Los Angeles (especially the latter). He recognizes some constellations, finds his own shapes in others, and when he is searching for the brightest star he can find, he is suddenly struck by the memory of the time Louis bought Harry a star for his birthday. He tears his gaze from the sky and finds Harry already looking at him. He wonders if he was thinking of the same thing. Louis’ cheeks heat, but, this time, he doesn’t tear his eyes away and holds Harry’s gaze as he takes another sip of his vodka redbull.

It is Harry that eventually breaks the contact, shifting to look at the crackling fire between them. Louis stays looking at Harry’s face and notices the way his cheeks are pink either from embarrassment or the several martinis he’s had. Shadows dance across his face with the rhythm of the fire. Louis sees Harry’s lip part, his tongue swiping over his bottom lip before he brings his drink to his mouth. Louis traces the line of his jaw as he swallows, watches the bob of his Adams apple.

Heat that isn’t from any fire settles low in Louis’ abdomen, threatening to gather in his groin, but just as he’s thinking he should discreetly adjust himself before he makes everyone uncomfortable, he notices that Niall has switched from playing old One Direction tunes and is now playing something only vaguely familiar.

Louis furrows his brows, trying to place the melody, and when he looks over at Niall, who is staring at him with a serious, unwavering gaze, it hits him all at once: Niall is playing one of Louis’ songs, a song Niall helped him write, a song that isn’t even recorded yet.

“What the fuck are you doing?” he blurts, and it comes out angry. It’s so loud and sudden that Harry jumps, spilling some of his drink onto his joggers, cursing. Liam looks startled too, looking up from his phone in curiosity. Even Niall stutters on the guitar, losing the rhythm of his plucking.

Niall recovers quickly, back to the melody he helped write, probably humming Louis’ lyrics in his head. “What?” he asks with feigned innocence.

“Louis?” Harry’s voice is small, something that resembles fear hiding behind the words. Louis would regret it in an instant, regret making him feel that way, but Louis is too petrified himself.

“What the _fuck_ are you doing?” Louis repeats, enunciating each word deliberately slow in a veiled threat.

Liam seems to have caught on, cocking his head as if to listen to the song better. “What song is this, Nialler?”

Niall ignores Louis’ words, but continues staring at him, opting instead to answer Liam. “Louis’.”

Oblivious, Liam turns to face Louis, surprise on his face. “Really?”

But Louis stares at Niall, who doesn’t shift his eyes either, tilting his head up in silent defiance as he continues to play. In the back of his mind, Louis recognizes he’s reached the pre-chorus.

“Niall,” Louis says lowly.

Louis knows that just to the right of him, tucked in his own chair, Harry is staring at him, searching the profile of Louis’ face for answers. He doesn’t know if he will find any there, hopes that he won’t, because that isn’t something Louis prepared to face this week. Or, ever, for that matter.

“You should sing it for us, Lou,” sweet, lovely, _stupid_ Liam offers.

“ _No._ ” Louis says it between his teeth; spits it, even. “No.”

Beyond Louis’ laser focus on Niall, he sees Liam’s face contort in confusion. Louis clenches his jaw, willing Liam not to push the subject and, to his credit, something must work because recognition dawns on his face, eyes darting quickly to Harry, then back to Louis.

“Why not?” Niall asks, voice dripping with sickly sweetness. There’s a smug smile on his lips as he raises his eyebrows, willing Louis to say it.

“You _know_ why,” Louis seethes.

Beside him, Harry audibly inhales, finally understanding.

That’s all it takes for Louis to stand abruptly, without a word, dropping his drink into the grass and stalk away from their little fire circle towards the direction of the street. Niall stops playing as he leaves. Louis even hears Harry hiss something to him.

“Louis,” Niall calls after him, “Louis, I’m sorry, I was just taking the piss, mate.”

“Fuck off,” Louis shouts back at him. He shoves his hands into his hoodie, palming his phone to make sure it’s there.

“Where are you going?” This time, it’s Harry who calls after him, but Louis still doesn’t turn.

Louis doesn’t even look over his shoulder until he reaches the door of a pub (some place with a bright neon lion on the side of it) and he’s asked to pull out his ID. It is then that he realizes he doesn’t have his wallet, and turns to head back to Harry’s, but finds Liam behind him, holding up his wallet like someone would dangle a dog a bone, one eyebrow raised inquisitively.

><

Louis is drunk. He is acutely aware that he hasn’t been this drunk with Liam since the last awards show they were at together, but he doesn’t let the thought get to him or he’ll get embarrassingly emotional. Or, rather, _more_ embarrassingly emotional.

“We’ve _all_ written songs about past loves,” Liam supplies, his voice slurring.

“Sure,” Louis admits as the world spins. “But you haven’t _performed_ them in front of said love for the first time without them even _knowing_.”

Liam could argue that he had done something close to that before, because one of his one-night stands had been attending an awards show that One Direction performed at with a song that was partially written about her. But he doesn’t, instead drunkenly rolling his eyes and exclaiming: “that was _hardly_ a performance.”

Louis pouts, sticking his lips out dramatically.

“Besides,” Liam adds, “it’s only _Harry_.”

Louis nearly laughs. “I’ve been saying that to myself for the past month.” He downs the last of his whiskey, grimacing at the fact that he admitted it out loud. He hopes Liam won’t remember tomorrow morning. Louis hopes _he_ won’t remember this in the morning.

“ _Harry’s_ written songs about _you_ ,” Liam says.

This time, Louis rolls his eyes. “I _know_ that. But this is different, and you know it.”

But Liam looks at him, confused. Maybe he really doesn’t follow or maybe he just wants Louis to explain it in order to audibly work through it himself, but, either way, Louis resigns with a sigh. Despite being often too thick in the head for his own good, Liam would make a good therapist. Louis has always found him easy to talk to. Not as easy as Zayn, of course, but that’s a thought for a different drunken night. Louis can only handle so much before he’s writing another fucking song.

“I heard _his_ songs about me for the first time in my own flat _by myself_ ,” Louis explains.

“You heard them live too,” Liam inserts.

Louis snaps his head to look at him, glaring. “That’s besides the point.”

“Okay,” Liam says, but he doesn’t sound convinced.

“The _first_ time I heard them,” Louis repeats. He feels like he’s shouting. He might be. It doesn’t matter. “The _first_ time I heard them I was by myself, hearing them through my computer in my own space.”

“You’ve _performed_ songs you’ve written about Harry _with_ Harry,” Liam says matter-of-factly, like it’s at all relevant to the current conversation.

“What are you _on_ about, Li?” Louis asks, exasperated.

“I’m only saying it’s part of the job.” Liam shrugs.

Louis raises an eyebrow, ready to fight, but, once again, resigns, supposing Liam has a point. His phone buzzes in his hoodie’s pocket, likely Niall again, but he doesn’t even bother to check it.

“Hey,” Liam says, looking up from his own phone and wiping his mouth to rid any stray liquid of his now finished drink. “It’s officially July 23rd.” He shoves the screen in Louis’ face to prove it, but it’s too close and Liam’s arm is vibrating from the liquor.

“Happy anniversary, mate,” Louis says with a laugh.

But something twinges inside of him as it occurs to Louis that, despite their breakup over three years ago, this is the first time the clock has struck midnight on July 23rd and he isn’t with Harry. It’s on par with pain of the first new year’s he didn’t ring in with Harry, the first birthday, and the anniversary of their auditions—the day they first met. Louis feels sick, either from the alcohol, the realization, the culmination of their conversation and confrontation with Niall, or all of the above. But just as he thinks to warn Liam he’s going to be sick and needs to go to the toilets, Louis’ eyes roll back into his head and he collapses to the floor.

>><<

_> > **A Love Like This** <<_

The second time Louis is conscious on July 23rd, he wakes up vomiting into a tiny waste bin beside Gemma’s bed. He heaves into the tiny bag-lined plastic thing, some sick splattering up and hitting him in the face and he wipes it off with his hoodie sleeve. He flops back onto the pillows, head spinning.

Light is streaming in through the window and Louis can even see that the sun is well into its journey through the sky—it must be close to midday. Louis throws an arm over his face, groaning. Then, louder, when he smells himself: all liquor and vomit and armpit sweat.

“Harry thought you’d die,” Niall says, and it startles Louis so bad he nearly shits himself as he sits up in a panic. He’d have been shooting from both ends.

He hadn’t noticed Niall in the room in his hungover fog, sitting by the closed door in the pink striped chaise lounge. If Louis didn’t feel like absolute shit and in an instant remembered being cross at him, he’d offer to buy Niall one. Louis was with Gemma when she got it from some posh furniture shop in London. They’d been approached by a fan that day, her eyes wide and knowing when she saw they were together. She took a picture with Louis and, to her credit, he never saw anything about him venturing out with Harry’s sister without Harry. They’d been shopping for his birthday.

“Wanted to take you to hospital,” Niall continues, watching Louis carefully with narrowed eyes. “Didn’t know how to tell him I’ve seen you worse.”

Louis’ pounding heart has settled, the pressure migrating to his head instead. He presses the pads of his fingers against his temples and squeezes his eyes shut to clear them.

“Fucking Christ,” he says, his voice like sandpaper.

Niall stands, moving towards the nightstand to grasp the bottle of water waiting there for him. There are blue pain relievers next to it and, when Niall offers them him, one in each hand, Louis takes them both. He drinks the water greedily before taking the pills and swallowing them down too. Niall sits silently next to Louis, looking at his own feet. Louis finishes the water bottle and crushes it in his hands.

“Take it Liam let me stay in here?” Louis breaks the silence, staring at Liam’s open suitcase.

He feels Niall nod beside him, their shoulders brushing with the movement. “You were way worse off than him. He was still pretty drunk. But he could walk. And we didn’t fancy having to wash the couch.” There’s a small laugh behind Niall’s words, but he doesn’t let it come out.

“’ve definitely drank more,” Louis says. “But I’m not as young as I used to be.”

Niall chuckles this time. “None of us are,” he says sincerely.

They linger in the silence for a moment, Louis’ eyes trained on the flowery wallpaper of Gemma’s childhood bedroom.

“I’m sorry, Lou,” Niall finally says, and Louis feels him turn to look at him. But Louis doesn’t return the look.

“Why?” He whispers the question, weak, too hungover and maybe still a little bit too drunk to even try to cloak how hurt he is.

“Dunno. . .” Niall answers honestly. “I was feeling brave and, I guess, I. . . dunno. . . I thought maybe you were too.”

“You can’t. . .” Louis thrusts his hands up to fiddle with his fringe before dropping them back down to his sides, exacerbated. “You can’t _do_ that.” His voice gets small again. “Not with him. . . not with Harry.”

“I’m sorry,” Niall says again, “stupidly, I thought, maybe you _wanted_ to talk about it.”

Louis wants to say that Niall’s not stupid, that anyone with eyes can see that Louis is on the verge of blurting out his every feeling for Harry at any given moment in time, but he doesn’t say it—can’t. “Of course, I want to talk about it,” he says instead, “but not. . . not like _this_. Not now. Not. . .”

“Here,” Niall finishes for him.

“Yeah,” Louis sighs, defeated.

They’re silent again, just the sound of Louis’ heart pounding in his ears and his stomach churning.

“He’s going to hear it eventually.”

“I know.”

Niall pats his knee once, twice, before squeezing it in comfort. He stands and shuffles in front of Louis towards the door.

“Come out when you’re ready,” Niall says, “Harry’s got fuck-all planned today. Or, at least, not anymore.”

Louis suppresses a smile. “I will. Might just lay down until my head stops spinning.”

Niall raises an eyebrow. “From the state you were in last night, that might be awhile.”

Louis doesn’t suppress the smile this time. “Fuck off, Niall.”

Niall laughs, turning the doorknob. “Let me know if you need anything,” he says over his shoulder.

“But I’m not taking care of _that.”_ He points with his thumb towards Louis’ bin of vomit on his way out.

Louis laughs, hard and loud, despite the way it makes his ears ring and his head pound.

><

Louis doesn’t join the boys until it’s dark outside once again and the laughter downstairs has become so unbearably loud that Louis no longer wants to be away from it. _FOMO_ he remembers Fizzy calling it. Niall had come back in periodically while Louis slept off his hangover, bringing him more water and some slices of toast, but he never pushed Louis to join the festivities. Louis supposes he’d learned his lesson from last night. Though perhaps Louis learned more of a lesson than Niall.

When he saunters down the hallway, looking fresh out of hell, his bag full of his own vomit dangling precariously between two of his fingers, the boys grow quiet until they see him appear.

Liam looks a little concerned, Harry’s eyebrows are furrowed and his mouth is parted like he was in the middle of speaking, but Niall’s already smiling at him, looking between the bag in his hand and his eyes, something clever clearly on the tip of his tongue.

“Not a word,” Louis demands, holding his finger up to Niall to silence him with a laugh.

It does the trick and as he travels to throw the vomit bag in the bin outside, he hears the boys laughter start right back up.

They don’t talk about it with practiced ease. After years spent in confined spaces with differing personalities and two band members switching between going at it like bunnies and fighting like an old married couple, the boys of One Direction could put “Avoiding Touchy Subjects” on their resumes.

Harry pulls out his dad’s board games, they play more FIFA, they even watch _This Is Us_ and play their drinking game that has become a tradition (Louis sits this one out). By the time July 23rd is nearly over, Louis really does feel like he’s 18 again: not just falling in love with Harry (because that’s already a given) but reconnecting with his best mates. Even he can admit that despite these festivities feeling insignificant compared to past years spent in paradise, Harry knocked it out of the park.

Niall and Liam are arguing about who between the two of them Zayn told first (after Harry) that he was leaving the band when Louis excuses himself for a smoke. He’d needed one anyway, desperate for one, actually, since he woke up more hungover than he’s been in a long time, but the current subject matter makes for a good exit anyway.

Louis lights up beside the fire pit, the chairs from the night before left out. It’s cold and dark but he welcomes the sensations as he welcomes the first inhale of nicotine. He sighs it out, feeling more like himself, finally.

His mood flickers like his lighter as he plays with it: burning bright and then snapping out and repeating it. His mind wanders to Zayn, wondering if he’s doing anything special with Gigi or his family for the day, but second-guesses it. This probably isn’t something Zayn celebrates. Louis is tempted to ask, tempted to call Zayn up and spill his guts, because when things get the most complicated with Harry, the first person he wants to call is Zayn. But there’s a reason Louis was last to know when Zayn decided to leave.

Louis doesn’t understand Zayn the way Zayn understands Louis. He never knew that knowing someone could be so one-sided until his friendship with Zayn. Zayn could read him like a book, turn to a random page in the middle of him and know exactly what it said and why it said that. But Louis couldn’t do that with Zayn. They were brothers, sure, but where everything Louis felt, Zayn felt along with him, Louis couldn’t feel what Zayn felt to the degree he felt it. _An empath_ , Harry had called it. It had sounded like an alien term the first time he heard it. He didn’t know what it meant. But what it came to mean is that not only did Zayn’s own pain become so much he couldn’t bear it, but watching Niall’s and Liam’s and Harry’s and Louis’—especially Louis’, apparently—had been so much he’d nearly died. So he left. And Louis was last to know because telling Louis would hurt the most. And because Louis didn’t understand Zayn, he’d never truly understand why Zayn left.

He’s on his second cigarette when he hears the garden door open and shut. He doesn’t have to turn to know it’s Harry, he feels the very air around him shift.

Harry sits in the chair to the left of him, looking at Louis for a moment before turning his attention to the fire pit, what Louis is currently concentrating on.

“Are you alright?” Harry’s voice is low, barely above a whisper.

“Yeah,” Louis says and, though it’s true, it sounds sad.

“Feeling better?” Harry alters the question.

“Yes.”

They sit in a comfortable silence, the only sounds the world around them and Louis’ smoking.

“Will it be on the album?” Harry breaks the tension with the loaded question, turning to look at Louis. He continues staring at the fire pit. Louis knows what he’s talking about, knows Harry knows he knows what he’s talking about, but, still, he doesn’t say anything. “The song,” Harry adds finally, “from last night.”

Louis takes a drag from his cigarette. He notices his fingers are shaking. He convinces himself it’s from the cold, but he’s shivering from something else, as there’s heat curling low in his belly and in the back of his throat. “Dunno, Harry.”

And maybe it’s the liquor that Harry has consumed tonight, but he continues to stare at Louis, despite him not staring back. Louis sees him lean towards him out of the corner of his eye.

“’ve got songs about you on my album,” he says.

Louis’ breath catches at that, can tell Harry is satisfied that the phrase has affected him.

“’s called _Fine Line_ , I’ve decided,” Harry continues.

His cigarette is frozen in front of mouth, Louis staring at the very end of it as it burns a faded orange in the dark. He waits for Harry to get up, to realize this conversation is one-sided but Harry, ever the stubborn bastard, waits for Louis.

Harry waits, props his chin on his fist for good measure.

Finally, Louis breaks from his haze and turns his attention finally, _finally,_ to Harry, convinced he can see the green of his eyes with just the moonlight to guide him.

“ _Walls_ ,” he says, and he sees the corners of Harry’s mouth turn upwards.

He knows Harry knows what it means, knows the song he’s referring to, because he was with Louis when he wrote it, when he brought it to their team for what would become their final album as One Direction. And Louis had been devastated when it was rejected but, after, Harry’d pulled him aside and whispered in his ear, all low and warm: “ _now it’s yours; only yours_.”

Harry hums, the pleasant smile plain on his face as he turns his attention back to the fire pit. Louis’ gaze lingers on Harry’s profile for a while longer: shamelessly taking in the long swoop of his nose, the upturned curve of his lips, the outline of his throat against the night.

“What about the one Niall played?” Harry asks. He’s getting brave now.

Louis pretends to be oblivious. Harry’s bravado is seeping into him. “What about it?”

“What’s it called?”

Harry’s lips twitch, Louis can see it in the dark—or, he’s just so accustomed to the way Harry’s face moves that he doesn’t _have_ to see it to know it happens. He feels confident, brave even, like before, when he knew Louis was going to succumb to his puppy dog eyes and take him to the restaurant he wanted.

But Louis doesn’t answer, opting instead to throw his cigarette butt into the fire pit to join his first one, standing when it rolls to rest against the stone circle. He stretches his arms above his head, knowing from the quirk of Harry’s head that he’s looking at the skin of his stomach that’s been revealed. He lowers his arms with a sigh, letting them slap against his sides.

He can see Harry’s pout in the dark, but he’s not looking at him, still watching the fire pit as if the name of Louis’ song is in there. Louis knows he could ask Niall and Niall would surely tell him under the right amount of duress and bribery, but Louis also knows Harry wants to hear him say it.

Louis takes two steps back to Harry’s dad’s house before stopping again, the silhouette of it feeling so familiar yet so far from his reach that a strange, simultaneous sense of comfort and longing settles deep in his stomach.

“ _Too Young_ ,” he says towards the house, but loud enough so Harry can hear him.

Harry inhales, Louis isn’t sure why: maybe because he didn’t think he’d say it or maybe because Harry can already somehow sense the song’s meaning just from the title. Louis wouldn’t be surprised if he did.

“Goodnight, Harry,” Louis says softly, this time unsure if it’s loud enough for Harry to hear, and he walks towards the house like he’s done so many times before, this time with the man he loves left behind instead of by his side.

And because it’s his last night in Holmes Chapel, because he has to return to the Soho Farmhouse tomorrow without the boys by his side and pretend he and his fake girlfriend are on vacation to celebrate the band that changed both of their lives, and because Louis so deeply, hopelessly loves Harry, he tilts his head to the sky, finds the star he decides is his and whispers: “but we’re not as young as we used to be.”

>><<

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thank you for reading. Please comment, leave kudos, and share if you liked it! :) xx


	4. Wish I Didn't Need So Much Of You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some loud pop song dance edit is thrumming in the club Louis’ already forgot the name of when it hits him like a wave crashing on a beach in high tide: Harry doesn’t know.
> 
> Harry doesn’t know how far gone Louis is for him—still—even after all this time. Harry doesn’t know that Louis’ written an entire album of songs—maybe even several albums worth—just dedicated to him. Harry doesn’t know that Louis wakes up tangled in his own sheets expecting to be tangled in Harry’s limbs. Harry doesn’t know that Louis still loves him; that he looks at him now and feels the same as he did years ago; that the only thing that’s changed is that they’re no longer together and Louis loves him all the same . . . but Harry doesn’t know.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Song of the Chapter: Defenceless
> 
> DISCLAIMER: This story is fiction (obviously). Never happened. Though this is based on real people, this story does not reflect them or their reality in the slightest.

** August 2019 **

_> > **Too Tired to be Tough** <<_

The USB drive that holds the entire contents of Louis’ heart weighs heavy in his pocket. His hand is idly shoved in there no matter what he’s doing, thumbing it over and over and rotating it into his hand until its shape is permanently carved into his skin. It becomes a habit throughout the evening; palming it through his pants to make sure it’s there, always pressing into it as if it could be anywhere else.

He hadn’t wanted to bring it. He mentioned off-handedly to Liam weeks ago that he couldn’t get this song to sound quite right. He wasn’t sure what sounded _off_ about it, but also wasn’t satisfied with the way it was. Liam suggested equally off-handedly that he could listen to it. “ _Fresh ears_ ,” Liam had said, “ _but also ears that know you_.” Louis couldn’t deny that it was a good idea, so he obliged. Liam isn’t the artist with melody that Niall is, is just now growing in his security with his own lyrics, and doesn’t have the confidence onstage that Harry does, but he is always a maestro in the studio; composition is his forte. Always has been, even when they were all stuck together in the studio for hours: sweaty, exhausted, and the same fucking song ringing in their heads over and over, Liam would be able to add something _just right_ that would complete the entire tune.

But they never got around to meeting up, Liam insisting he wanted to hear it for the first time with Louis in the room, and all of a sudden, it’s Liam’s birthday and Louis’ got his entire fucking album on a USB drive in his pocket at dinner with Liam’s family.

When the waiter brings around breadsticks amounting enough to feed a small village, Louis thinks to himself that it’d be just his luck that he’s got a hole in his pocket and the thing drops on the floor and his first solo album would be in the hands of some lucky fucker who’d likely bleed him dry or threaten to leak it. Not that that’s irregular for Louis. In this strangely thrilling hypothetical situation Louis has concocted, he thinks he’d even encourage this person to leak his album just so fucking Simon can’t line his pockets with the product of Louis’ blood, sweat, and tears; his heart and soul.

So, Louis spends the entire evening eating one-handed and hoping to god that Liam’s wise insight will be worth the way his heart is pounding out of his chest.

By the time Liam’s bid everyone goodbye, made a show of ensuring his son is good for Cheryl in front of his mother, and tipped the waitstaff so generously the manager’s jaw nearly drops to the floor, Louis’ insides resemble the soup he had with the first course.

“Tommo,” Liam’s sudden voice low in his ear nearly startles him out of his skin.

Louis blinks, realizing he is sat completely alone in the middle of the extra-long table with his hand still shoved in his pocket.

“Can we get the _fuck_ out of here?” Louis grumbles, pushing his chair back and knocking Liam off balance for good measure.

“Glad you enjoyed celebrating with my family,” Liam says drily, “it’s not like an honor or anything—being the only one not of blood relation.”

Louis just glowers, pointedly avoiding Liam’s sarcasm. He should know why Louis is all worked up. “Cheryl was here.”

“She’s the mother of my child,” Liam says like Louis didn’t already know.

“Whatever.”

Liam laughs, clearly enjoying making Louis feel uncomfortable and Louis had truly forgotten what it felt like to have brothers. Despite himself, a grin stretches across his lips.

“To my place then?” Liam declares.

“Need a drink first,” Louis answers honestly, “want one?”

Liam shakes his head. “Trying out cutting back, remember?”

Louis furrows his brows. “You’ve rented out an entire club tomorrow, Li.”

“I said cutting _back_ not cutting _off_.” Liam rolls his eyes.

“Fine,” Louis says with feigned exasperation. “Doesn’t change that I need one.”

And if Liam is surprised or disappointed by the amount of liquor Louis tosses back without any sort of grimace or if he remembers why he chews on a maraschino cherry after his final shot of vodka, he doesn’t say anything.

><

The studio in Liam’s home is the smallest that Louis’ ever been in, but it feels entirely _Liam_ and Louis has to bite back asking if he could record here sometime. Liam would say yes, of course he would say yes, and he’d even offer to start remixing some of Louis’ songs, like _right now_ , but there’s a reason they’re still on hiatus. They joke that it’s because _separation makes the heart grow fonder_ or some shit but, really, it’s because they were all so suffocated by each other for so long that they all nearly ended up like Zayn; developing increasingly unhealthy coping mechanisms, becoming regulars at celebrity rehab facilities, and breaking up with the entire world on Facebook.

“Alright, Tommo, whip it out.”

Louis chokes on his own spit in laughter at the proud look on Liam’s face at his joke. In the back of his mind he thinks it’s something Harry would find equally as funny, but he doesn’t let himself dwell on the thought. _Not now._

He pulls the USB from where it’s made its home in the lining of Louis’ pocket and slides it into the computer. His heart is pounding in his chest, this somehow feeling more vulnerable than he was drunk off his ass last month in a bar in Holmes Chapel. And the way that Liam’s looking at him—like he’s so grateful Louis is opening up to him again—isn’t helping.

The computer thinks for a moment longer as it opens the drive before flickering to life and displaying the long list of tracks Louis’ been working on for the past two years.

“Jesus fuck, Lou,” Liam breathes as his eyes widen at the screen. “How many are there?”

“On this drive, like fifty-something.” Louis shrugs as he leans back into the comfy engineering chair. “How many I want on the album? Twenty-eight.”

Louis doesn’t look to see, but he can feel Liam give him a knowing smile. Liam leans forward, inspecting all the file names.

“ _’Shitfuck 2.0_?’” Liam reads.

“Haven’t got a title for that one yet,” Louis explains hastily as he scrambles for the mouse, yanking it by the cord out of Liam’s hand. He scrolls his way to find the file he needs Liam to hear, double clicking on it to initiate the studio program so Liam can’t snoop through his other titles anymore.

He leans back, oddly shy, and tucks his knees against his chest as they watch the screen load.

“What is it you need my help with, again?” Liam asks.

“I don’t know, exactly,” Louis replies unhelpfully. “It just doesn’t . . .” He waves his hand like it explains anything. “I like the way it sounds, Sam and Benji have done a sick job, but there’s just something. . . it’s missing something. Not sure what. Thought you might. . .”

Liam raises an eyebrow. “I can try, but I can’t be all that helpful when I don’t really know what your _sound_ is like anymore.”

He’s right. But Louis pretends to be offended. “Thought you were the _composition wizard_?” Liam sees right through his feigned frustration as he uses the nickname Liam drunkenly gave himself one night, years ago, after Simon back-handedly praised him for how he turned _Hey, Angel_ into something “poorly resembling a rock ballad” and rescued it from the rejection pile.

“Let me see what I can do,” Liam says as the program opens, lines and lines of different instruments and vocals pouring onto the screen in quick succession. He cracks his knuckles for good measure. “I’d be able to do more if you’d let me hear more of—.”

“Nope,” Louis says loudly, popping the “p.”

Liam pretends to pout. “Niall’s heard them.”

“Niall’s nosier and more annoying than you.”

Liam laughs as he pulls out his pair of headphones, handing a spare to Louis. Louis takes them but sets them on the sound board in front of them.

“You listen,” Louis says, “I want to watch you listen, if you don’t mind.”

His breath catches, the words out of his mouth before he can stop them, heavy with meaning. Countless times he’d sat with Harry like this: showing him a song for the first time, watching him listen to it, chewing on his lip and examining his face for his reaction. He could always tell what Harry was thinking from his face. Harry was convinced he wasn’t good with words unless he planned them. That wasn’t the truth, of course, he just needed _time_ to speak, and Louis would always give him time, but after years of writing and singing and listening together, they were able to work through a song sometimes with _out_ words.

But even without the deep emotional connection shared with the listener, Louis _does_ think he has a knack for reading people’s gut reactions on their faces.

Liam must notice Louis’ faraway look, pausing before putting the headphones over his ears, but he doesn’t push. _Not like Niall would_. “Okay.”

Louis tugs his bottom lip into his mouth, teeth biting at the chapped skin there as Liam plays the song. Louis watches, examines the way Liam’s brows furrow in some parts, raise in others; the way his eyes widen and narrow; how his lips purse and frown in concentration.

Liam listens to _We Made It_ seven times before finally pulling off his headphones.

“You’re right,” he offers finally, “it is missing something.”

That satisfies Louis in some ways but frustrates him in others. “ _What_ though?” he demands.

“I don’t know,” Liam answers honestly, sheepish.

Louis drapes himself dramatically into a laying position on the chair with a flourish and a deep groan, wiping a hand over his face. “No help at all, _wizard_ ,” he grumbles, chin in his chest.

Liam stares at him for a moment before wordlessly scrolling through the song’s audio and instrumental tracks. Louis doesn’t watch him this time, just frowns at his own shoes as he toes at the carpet lining the studio floor. Liam takes so long on the computer that Louis thinks he’s actually offended him, raises his head to say something, but finds Liam already looking at him.

He’s opening and closing his mouth over and over like a fish.

“What?” Louis demands. He shuffles back into a normal sitting position, leaning his elbows onto the booth and putting his chin in his hands.

“If you don’t mind me asking. . .” Liam says, “is this about—?”

Louis doesn’t let him finish. “Yeah.” He says softly, resigned. “ _Of course_ it is Liam, I know you don’t need to ask.”

“Okay,” Liam says gently, like he’s wary of him. He’s quiet for several moments until; softly, like he could break: “are you okay, Louis?”

The question startles him the same way Liam’s voice sneaking up behind him did earlier: nearly makes him jump out of his skin.

“Yeah,” Louis answers too quickly, “’m fine.”

And Liam opens his mouth again, to protest or to push Louis to open up further, he isn’t sure, but he doesn’t get the chance because his phone is ringing in his pocket.

Louis can’t help the quiet sigh of relief that huffs from his lips as Liam pulls his phone from his jeans. He had not been prepared to answer any sort of line of questioning in regard to his well-being, much less so about _Harry Styles_.

Liam looks at his phone, then at Louis. “Erm.”

“What?”

Louis glances down at Liam’s phone screen just as he tugs it out of his line of sight, but not before Louis sees a vaguely familiar picture.

“Is that—?”

Liam jumps out of his chair before he has to answer, fiddling with the screen before putting the phone against his ear.

“What’s up?” Liam says into the speaker as he steps out of the studio.

Louis lets his head thunk against the booth in front of him as he crumples into a heap in the chair with a groan. Harry Styles, the king of _perfect fucking timing_.

To keep his mind from swallowing itself, Louis counts the colored triangles in the carpet at his feet.

He doesn’t stop counting until Liam is stepping back into the booth, breath heavy around them like he’s run a marathon. Louis sits up, well aware of the straight red line identing the skin of his forehead from his time spent pressed against the corner of the sound board, following Liam’s path with his eyes as he returns to his chair.

“Erm.”

Louis doesn’t say anything.

“That was Harry.”

“Gathered,” Louis says slowly. He tries not to let the strange _yearning_ gathering on the back of his tongue slip into his voice, but he thinks he fails.

“He’s, uh, he’s—”

“I _know_ he’s coming tomorrow, Li, it’s your birthday, it’s never been an issue before.”

“He’s bringing Grimmy,” Liam says all at once.

Louis’ retort (something along the lines of Liam being _so fucking dramatic_ ) dies on his tongue. Instead, he’s left gasping, searching for breath like he’s just got the wind knocked out of him. He’d think his heart had stopped if it wasn’t beating so loud—too loud—and arrhythmic in his ears. An eerie anger, hot and acidic, is gathering in his abdomen.

“ _What?_ ”

“Technically—” Liam rushes, “technically _I_ invited him, but—”

“ _W h a t_?”

“It was a _Radio 1_ thing, I invited him and this other bloke on air, I didn’t think it was that serious and, I guess he didn’t either, ‘cause he brought it up to Harry and said that he’d be in London anyway and Harry’d said he could come with him.”

Liam’s looking at him, Louis can see the mix of apprehension and regret in his eyes, but Louis is looking past him, through the glass window pane into the recording booth and the foam sound panels, fighting the urge to go in there and punch his fists at the soft material until it’s not-so-soft and his knuckles are red and wet.

“What?” Louis says again.

“Is that okay? I—Do you want me to. . .?” Liam’s scrambling. “I can. . .”

But the edges of Louis’ vision are blurring, fading into black and red, and there’s a metallic taste at the back of his throat that resembles the feeling like he’s going to throw up. Harry knows—he is _painfully aware_ of this insecure hatred Louis has for Nick Grimshaw. Nick and Harry were always close, remained so, apparently, and, when they were dating, Louis didn’t _mistrust_ Harry, knew Harry would never _ever_ give Louis a reason to even _think_ he couldn’t trust Harry, especially not because of _Nick fucking Grimshaw_ , but Louis _couldn’t stand him_.

Nick was the friend that didn’t know Louis. Everyone in their lives knew Louis: of course Niall, Liam, and Zayn knew Louis, but even friends of Harry’s became friends of Louis, and even _Gemma_ considered Louis a friend and not just “the guy dating my brother.” So, when Harry had an issue with Louis that he just wanted to complain about, he had to go to the friend that wasn’t also equally invested in Louis’ life. And that friend was Nick. Louis supposes that was partially his fault. From the first moment he met Nick, he was far too interested in Harry for Louis’ liking, his jealousy always spiking because Nick made him laugh as much as Louis did and _of course_ Nick adored Harry because who _didn’t_ adore Harry, but Louis thought it was too much because Harry adored him _back_.

Harry never really understood Louis’ possessiveness of him when it came to Nick, never understood why Louis grew so insecure about him: “ _we’re just_ friends _, Lou, that’s it_ ”; but he knew how Louis felt. Harry became equally protective of his friendship with Nick, never allowing Louis to approach the topic. It made sense to Louis, his friendship with Nick, but he never liked it. But he always told Harry he didn’t have to like it, he wanted Harry to be happy, and if that meant going to Nick when he didn’t want to go to anyone else, Louis could live with that. Just like Harry didn’t understand why Nick made him insecure, Louis didn’t understand why Harry needed someone like Nick to go to, but he never held that against him.

In reality, all of Louis’ issues with Grimmy were issues he had with himself. It took getting out of the relationship he nearly drowned in to see it, but Louis knows that he hated Nick because he put Harry back together if Louis broke him. It always hurt more when he went to Nick instead of Niall or Liam or Zayn, because it meant Louis fucked up so royally that either Harry didn’t want to be with anyone associated with Louis or knew that if Niall or Liam or Zayn heard what he had done, they’d hate Louis too, and even when Harry was fucking fuming at Louis, he never wanted anyone to hate him. Harry’d told him so, one day, lifetimes ago, after a fight about Grimmy. _“You already hate yourself enough,”_ he’d cried, already holding the weight of the world on his shoulders at seventeen, _“I can’t let you think your best friends hate you too.”_

It was immature and stupid, this run around thing they had between the two of them, all because of Nick Grimshaw, but it was something they never resolved. So, naturally, just hearing his name is enough to send poison curdling through Louis’ veins.

And like the wave of rage that crashed over him in the first place, a sudden spark of self-awareness has Louis resigning in his mind. It was so childish, his hatred of this man he barely knew, and it is even more childish that he is still letting it get to him when the real source of his insecurities—his fear that Harry would find someone better and leave him—isn’t even a _factor_ anymore.

Louis sucks in a deep breath once, twice, three times before looking back at Liam, who is already staring at him with wide, unblinking eyes; eyebrows furrowed in concern.

“Sorry, Liam,” Louis says, his voice pained but still calm and measured. An intrusive thought wedges its way into his brain: _Harry would be proud_. “I didn’t mean. . .” Louis breathes again, starting over. “It’s fine, honestly, it’s fine.”

“Louis—”

“Liam,” Louis interrupts gently. “I appreciate the concern, I really do, but I’m an adult. I reacted poorly just now but I. . .” He waves his hand around like that will collect his thoughts into a cohesive sentence. “I needed time to process, and now I’ve processed. It’s fine.”

Liam looks like he’s going to protest again.

“I’m an adult,” Louis repeats. “So is Harry, so is Nick. Whatever history was there, is there—between all of us—it doesn’t matter. We’re adults, we can behave like adults.” _It’s just one night_ , Louis thinks, but he doesn’t say it.

Though he still looks like he isn’t entirely convinced, Liam’s eyebrows flutter back down to their resting position. “Okay,” he mutters.

“I do appreciate the warning, though,” Louis says, lifting his voice up into a joking tone.

It works, Liam letting out a breathy laugh. “Okay,” he says, and he sounds more like himself.

Liam turns back to the computer, scrolling through the tracks a couple of times more before glancing at the clock in the corner of the screen. “Shit, it’s late.”

“Any ideas?” Louis prompts.

“None at the moment,” Liam admits. He rotates his chair to face him. “Would you mind if I downloaded it, fiddled around with it some more, and then got back to you?”

Louis laughs. _As if he would ever mind_. “Just don’t tell Simon.”

Liam’s eyes bug out in horror, startled, before recognizing the light self-deprecating humor and laughing himself, albeit a little bit uncomfortably.

“Okay,” Liam agrees.

He burns _We Made It_ onto his own computer, Louis watching carefully as he shuffles it into a folder he creates in Louis’ name. Louis can’t help the way his name on a folder of audio files on Liam’s computer makes his mouth quirk up in a smile. It feels remnant of a different time, a different life, but it is also far too familiar; sending warmth in flames under his skin and the taste of cherries on the back of his tongue.

_> ><< _

_> > **Hope That I’m Not Asking Too Much** <<_

Louis is comfortably drunk by the time Harry makes his grand entrance. He doesn’t even notice he’s arrived until he’s stood right in front of him, if Louis’ honest, so used to arriving places _with_ Harry or _around_ Harry (to protect their reputation) that as soon as he isn’t, he couldn’t care less (but that isn’t entirely true).

He’s dancing with some bloke and a blonde that looks vaguely of Bebe Rexha (but _isn’t_ —she wasn’t invited, much to Louis’ chagrin) when Harry walks past—smelling all smokey and rosey and cedar-y—and Louis wouldn’t have noticed if his nostrils hadn’t flared at the right time, inhaling Harry’s essence.

Harry isn’t _supposed_ to smell like smoke, his drunk brain registers, he’d only smell of smoke if he was still with _Louis_ but at the same moment, he realizes that _Nick_ smokes and it sends a sour sickness careening into his stomach.

The smell of Harry registers in Louis’ brain as he walks past before he even sees the curly-haired man, convincing himself it was a trick of the club in his head and the liquor saturated in his veins, until Liam’s drunkenly dragged Harry to stand before Louis, cheeks heated.

“Louis,” Liam slurs, “Harry’s here.”

Louis stops dancing, the man behind him taking a hint through his ceased grinding, slinking away back into the crowd.

“I see,” Louis says, voice clipped, but he can’t tell if either one hear it over the loud music.

Harry blinks at him through lashes heavy with liquor—mimicking Louis’ own.

“Jus’ wanted t’let y’know,” Liam slurs again before darting away in an unglamorous flourish.

The crowd around them continues to throb, pulsing with the beat of the music, as Louis and Harry remain motionless in the center of the dance floor. Harry looks as if he wants to move away, hide amongst the people Liam dragged him from, but he doesn’t move and neither does Louis.

“So, you brought Nick,” Louis says (but he has to shout it over the speakers and the volume of the crowd around them) and he regrets it as soon as it is out of his mouth—but it is already out into the world, gracing Harry’s face with a grimace and a flash of regret behind his eyes.

“I did,” Harry says. “Liam invited him.”

“And so did you,” Louis says before he can stop himself.

Harry snaps his mouth shut, looking Louis up and down for the first time, his own alcohol consumption making him brazen. A deeper hue of red blushes his cheeks.

Louis takes the opportunity to similarly take in Harry’s appearance—dressed in all black but a sheer top that puts all of his tattoos on display. Louis recognizes some of the ink—imprinted into his skin while they were still in the band—but sees others he has only seen from photos leaked online. Harry’s boots are a deep red—a red that strikes Louis as his favorite, but the thought doesn’t linger in his head too long.

“You look good, H.” Louis says before he can stop himself, the compliment a slip of the tongue, just as someone behind him bumps into his back, thrusting him face-first towards Harry.

Harry catches him, steadying Louis with two hands on his shoulders that leave imprints of heat in the shape of his palms.

“You. . .” Harry starts the beginning of his own compliment, but trails off, lifting his hands from Louis’ skin as if it takes great effort and leaving them to drape by his side, fingers twitching. “Thank you,” he decides to finish.

Between them, there is silence, despite the fire crackling and connecting the heat radiating from their skin. But around them, the dancing and music throbs, pushing them closer together as the crowd throngs in and out like the heartbeat loud in Louis’ ears.

Some loud pop song dance edit is thrumming in the club Louis’ already forgot the name of when it hits him like a wave crashing on a beach in high tide: Harry doesn’t know.

Harry doesn’t know how far gone Louis is for him—still—even after all this time. Harry doesn’t know that Louis’ written an entire album of songs—maybe even several albums worth—just dedicated to him. Harry doesn’t know that Louis wakes up tangled in his own sheets expecting to be tangled in Harry’s limbs. Harry doesn’t know that Louis still loves him; that he looks at him now and feels the same as he did years ago; that the only thing that’s changed is that they’re no longer together and Louis loves him all the same . . . but Harry doesn’t know.

“Harry. . .” Louis starts just as Harry says:

“Can we talk?”

“Sure,” Louis answers just as Harry responds:

“Yes?”

They both crack a smile, Harry’s dimples making an appearance while only one side of Louis lips quirks up.

“Follow me,” Louis jerks his chin up in indication, his fingers twitching at his side. Under normal circumstances, if it were years ago, he would take Harry’s hand and lead him that way but, instead, he just trusts that he will follow him as he walks towards the most secluded place at the party.

The coat check is the only quiet place in the whole club; muffled from the hanging up clothes and enclosed space, but Louis even tips the attendant a couple bills just to leave them alone. He faces the jackets and sweaters hanging up, a forced tight-lipped smile trained to his face before he finally turns back to face Harry, who is lingering in the doorway, eyebrows furrowed.

From the look on Harry’s face, Louis is struck by the thought that they’ve made out in this very room before, but brushes the thought away when he, even tipsy, remembers Liam and Niall always pick venues for their birthdays that they had never been to as One Direction—it’s just safer that way, for all parties involved.

“I. . .” Harry starts, but trails off, just as Louis blurts out:

“January.”

Louis backtracks, registering Harry had started to say something. “What?”

Harry furrows his brows further, his face resembling a scowl. “What?” he echoes.

“Erm,” Louis starts, figuring he was the one with the most complete thought. “January,” he repeats. “When the album comes out— _my_ album. . . January.”

“Oh,” Harry responds. He tugs his lower lip between his teeth. Maybe it’s the liquor but Louis wants to put it between his teeth too. A familiar heat settles low in his belly at the thought.

“What were you gonna say?” Louis hastily asks. He toes the carpet with the edge of his shoe. He doesn’t know if it sounds as desperate to Harry as it does to himself, but he ignores the consideration.

“Oh,” Harry says again. “Erm. I’m. . . sorry?”

Louis’ mouth opens, then shuts, then opens again; gaping like a fish. “For. . . what?” They’re reverting to saying nothing that means everything again.

“For. . .” Harry thinks. Louis doesn’t have to see it on his face to know he is searching his brain for the proper words. “For. . . the, erm, songs, I guess?”

It’s Louis’ turn to furrow his brows in confusion. He opens his mouth to ask, but he doesn’t have to.

“The. . . the songs about . . . me,” Harry clarifies. “Like the one. . .” This time, it is Harry that doesn’t have to finish, Louis knowing without him saying it.

They’re both too drunk to be having this conversation, Harry’s eyes focusing and unfocusing on Louis, pupils dilating and shrinking at random intervals as Louis tries to follow the innerworkings of his brain that he never truly understood, even when they knew each other best, and Harry fades in and out of clarity in Louis’ eyes—blurring into focus and then painfully out of focus until he takes up all of Louis’ berth of vision.

“Oh,” Louis breathes and he can’t help the way it comes out of him like the ghost of emotion. “That’s. . . that’s okay.” And it is, it always will be; Louis will write songs about Harry until he can’t write anymore—good, bad, ugly. . . whatever it takes to prove to the world the complexities of the man he loves.

“I mean,” Louis stumbles, as he always does when it comes to Harry. “You’ve got. . . You’ve written songs about me. . . “ Louis grimaces with his own presumption, despite Harry telling himself this truth last month in his dad’s garden. “. . . right?”

But Harry moves past Louis’ second-guess of himself without a second thought. “Yes,” he confirms with a nod, curls bouncing against his forehead.

“Then. . . ,” Louis offers, “then, I suppose, we’re even.”

Harry’s nose scrunches—the way it did when he tried to hide his smile from the world—and it sends warmth into Louis’ veins like it’s been injected with a needle. His mouth purses, scrunching together until his lips wrinkle and his left dimple indents into his cheek.

“I suppose so,” Harry says, just as his mouth stretches into a full grin.

Despite himself, Louis’ gaze drops to his lips to watch him smile. They linger there for too long, he notices, tearing them away to look back into Harry’s own green eyes. But his dart up to meet his at the same time. Louis’ eyebrows twitch. He wants to kiss him, wonders if Harry wants that too.

Wherever this conversation is going, though, it doesn’t end up there, because Liam stumbles into the coat check room, falling into hangers with a dramatic rattle before launching himself into Harry’s side, pushing his face into his shoulder.

“There y’are,” he says, his voice loud and his mouth wide.

“All right,” Harry says, leaning Liam’s embrace and patting his back with a firm hand, smile still focused on Louis, who can’t help the way he melts.

“—was lookin’ all over for ya,” Liam slurs into Harry’s shirt. “I got an idea.”

“What—?” Harry starts, but Liam cuts him off just as he’s got the word out.

“Shh,” Liam interrupts, pushing a sloppy index finger into Harry’s lips to silence him that makes Louis bristle protectively, despite himself. 

“’s a secret,” Liam mumbles to Harry, tugging him with a hand circled around his wrist that similarly makes Louis want to reach out and pull his touch away from Harry. “Come on, then.”

Harry grins at Louis as he’s pulled out the door, mouthing “sorry” to him with lips that Louis is suddenly struck by how red they are. But he doesn’t need to apologize, Harry tugged away too fast for Louis to tell him that, as this is perhaps the most honest discussion they’ve had in quite some time, but even Louis doesn’t know if he could’ve even admitted that.

And if Louis doesn’t return to the dance floor but instead to the bar—where he downs several top shelf vodka shots back to back and chases them with a single maraschino cherry each with a familiar name etched onto his tongue—no one has to know.

_> ><< _

_> > **Lost in my Head** <<_

When Louis enters the studio on Monday, head still pounding and everything muffled in his ears like he’s hearing it underwater, everyone looks up at him expectantly. He’s late—of course he’s late—but he doesn’t expect the glowers from his band, the disbelief from his engineers, and a strange look of suppressing constipation from his assistant.

Louis lowers his sunglasses down his nose, squeezing one eye shut to combat the brightness in the albeit dim studio. He frowns over his cup of coffee. “What?”

“Liam sent over the track,” Carlos squeaks. He’s glancing between Sam and Benji, and looking desperately to Louis for an explanation he doesn’t have.

“Yeah?” Louis sips his drink. It burns his tongue. But he takes another drink anyway.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” Sam mutters.

Louis doesn’t hear him. “What?”

“You shouldn’t have _fucking_ done that,” Sam blurts, louder.

Louis rips the sunglasses from his face with his free hand, grimacing at the light. “What the fuck are you _on_ about, he’s not even going to be credited, no one will know.”

“Are you fucking serious?” Sam stands from his chair, invading Louis’ space in one long stride until he’s towering above him, seething. Louis takes a step back despite himself. He’s never seen Sam this mad. “What do you mean ‘ _no one will know,_ ’ the whole bloody world will, are you that fucking _stupid_?”

“What are you _talking_ about?” Louis begs. The paper cup is gripped so tight in his fist he’s worried his fingers will bust through the material and it’ll scald his skin. But that potential burning pales in comparison to how _fucking confused_ he is right now.

“You’re not just messing with your own life anymore, Louis,” Sam says through his teeth, “it’s not just your reputation that you’ve got riding on this album.” He gestures with an open hand to everyone in the room. “All of us have our names on this too.” Louis opens his mouth to say something, but Sam keeps going: “If you think Simon won’t have each of our asses for this—”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Louis shrieks one more time, his voice an octave higher than it usually is. He’s exasperated, confused, so tired of being talked down to, and so _painfully_ fucking hungover. “Liam was just fucking with the composition! I told him it was missing something, and he just wanted to help! We don’t have to use his bloody edits! Christ!”

His outburst is met with silence. Sam’s face crumbles into one of confusion, reflecting Louis’ own. He glances at the men surrounding him, but they are all equally bewildered.

“Louis,” Sam says, slowly, carefully, and finally at a lower volume that isn’t making needles prick into Louis’ skin. “Have. . . have you heard it yet?”

“No!” Louis exclaims, thrusting his arms up so hard a few drops of coffee slip out of the opening on the lid. “That’s what I’ve been trying to _tell_ you.”

The room is silent again, everyone exchanging knowing glances while Louis is left feeling like the child who’s just walked in on his parents talking about him again.

“What?” he demands more than asks.

Sam sighs. “Just. . .” He gestures for Louis to follow him into the sound booth, which he does, while everyone else watches the two leave.

When they take their seats behind the mixing table, Sam hands Louis a pair of headphones.

“Carlos?” Louis asks, “can you…?” The question isn’t even out before Carlos is scrambling into the booth after them, opening his hands for Louis’ coffee. “Thanks,” he mutters, but he pretends not to see the strange, inquisitive gaze behind Carlos’ eyes and places the headphones over his ears.

 _We Made It_ flows into his eardrums, Louis’ acoustic guitar riffs and his own voice filtering smoothly in and out of the speakers along with the other instruments played by the band members in front of the glass. They’re all watching him as he listens, and Louis suddenly realizes how strange his friends—how Harry—must feel whenever he asks them to do this: listen while he watches.

The song sounds the same to him, Louis furrowing his brows and wondering what the hell Liam even changed to make everyone react the way they did—if he even changed anything.

And then he makes it to the second chorus.

It starts out the same as it always has been, normal and unchanged like the rest of the song, but there’s an unfamiliar echo that comes after “goodbye.” Then, again, a harmony on “time” that wasn’t there before. And another echo after “eyes.” It all sends heat electrifying into his veins, but Louis isn’t sure why.

Louis furrows his brows again, glancing over to Sam, who is watching him with a grim look on his face. He pauses the song when he meets Louis’ eyes. They both pull their headphones off.

“Is that all Liam changed?” Louis asks, but there’s something behind his words that even he can’t place. “What is that? I don’t understand why—”

“Just keep listening,” Sam says.

Cautiously, Louis replaces his headphones over his ears. Sam doesn’t, instead flipping the switch to allow the song to filter in to the recording studio speakers as well.

His song enters his headspace again, the second verse similar to the first where Liam hasn’t appeared to change anything.

But, this time, when the third chorus comes around, that second voice—the echo and the harmony that wasn’t there before—sings with Louis through the chorus nearly in its entirety, standing out with the echoes and harmonies in the same places as the previous chorus.

And it works—it’s _beautiful_ even.

But Louis is so used to that voice molding with his own, flowing in and out of his headphones intertwined with his own lyrics, his own songs, that he doesn’t hear it, doesn’t recognize it, doesn’t understand what Liam has done until the song is over and Louis pulls the headphones off his ears to look at Sam sideways.

“What’s the problem?” he asks.

Sam furrows brows in disbelief. His mouth opens and closes around nothing, gaping like a fish as he tries to find the words. “How could you not. . .?”

“Louis,” someone says from inside the recording studio, beyond the glass. It’s Benji, Louis sees, sitting on a stool in between his bassist and drummer, staring at him with a similar bewildered look. “You’re taking the piss right?”

Louis glances between his team, his small smile fading. “I’m not, I swear. . . What’s—what’s happening? What did I miss?”

“Louis,” Carlos says softly from behind him. Louis turns in his chair slowly, having forgotten he was there, still standing, waiting, with Louis’ coffee in his hand. “Louis that’s—that’s _Harry_.”

And the blood rushes out of Louis’ body like a crashing wave.

 _Harry Harry Harry_.

How could he have not heard it—him? How could he have not noticed? How could he miss it—him—this voice that formulated the entirety of his late teens and early 20s? How could this song that was missing something—everything—be made complete by one fucking voice echoing Louis’?

He gapes, jaw going slack and mouth dropping open as he’s rendered completely brainless. “What?” he manages.

But he’s greeted with silence, Carlos’ gaze flickering between Louis’ and the coffee. So, he turns his chair again, facing Sam and the rest of his band. “What?” he repeats.

They all stare back at him for a moment, letting the new revelation sink into Louis’ bones until he thinks it may crack them, until Benji nods. “Yeah.”

“Yeah,” Sam says at the same time, “it’s Harry.”

“It’s Harry?” Louis repeats and he can’t help the way his voice is weak saying his name, the way it makes him waver.

“It’s Harry,” Sam confirms, voice barely above a whisper.

“Harry,” Louis murmurs. He stares at the computer screen in front of him, taking the mouse from Sam’s hand and scrolling until he sees the foreign track hidden between one named “ _yeahs_ ” and another named “ _bass 2_ ”. “ _h_ ” it says. Nothing else; just “ _h_.”

“Louis,” Sam says softly and Louis registers that his hand is on his shoulder, squeezing a comforting pressure into his body to ground him. “We can’t publish it, mate, not like this.”

“Harry,” Louis breathes again.

And it’s like the man has entered the studio with him, like old times, like before, and Harry is standing behind him, whispering something into his ear that is meant only for Louis and no one else; and Louis knows that he’s too in love to care, too tired of resisting his own feelings, and too blind to see anything but blue sky and golden sun, but still he decides: “yes we can.”

_> ><< _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do I think that Harry really tapped in to sing on _We Made It_? No. Did I see a ridiculous fan theory about that and run with it just for this fic? Sure did. Enjoy!
> 
> As always, thank you for reading. Please comment, leave kudos, and share if you liked it! :) xx


	5. I Know What I Already Knew

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There’s flight transparent in Harry’s eyes; he’s about to run from Louis—physically and metaphorically—flee back into Niall’s hotel suite and break this sliver of intimacy that Louis has been craving since that last moment in his LA penthouse all those years ago, about to reverse time and bring them back to where they started and that sends such grief spiraling into Louis’ veins that he has to think of something—anything—to make Harry stay and he opens his mouth to say something—anything—like "it’s okay, I wanted you to" or "please do it again" or even "I’m so fucking in love with you please don’t leave me again."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Song of the Chapter: Habit
> 
> DISCLAIMER: This story is fiction (obviously). Never happened. Though this is based on real people, this story does not reflect them or their reality in the slightest.

** September 2019 **

**_> > Gave Me the Time and the Space < < _ **

By the time Niall’s birthday celebrations roll around, Louis’ band and sound engineers have finally stopped giving him sideways glances whenever they’re in the studio. They’re still on edge, still dreading Simon & Co’s final listen, but Louis has insisted that they can pull it off. And, despite hours of protesting that nearly ended in a physical altercation, even Sam is on board, simply to see if they can do it. And, really, it’s Louis’ ass on the line. If Simon catches on, he’d know exactly who to blame. That fact quelled the fears of his co-workers and filled Louis with an odd sense of thrill: _finally,_ a secret Simon isn’t privy to. Louis is so confident in this scheme, so trusting of his friends that he’s promised to buy the whole engineering team McLaren’s once the album is distributed and Simon can’t take it back even if he does figure it out.

He’d called Liam that Monday after listening to it, each call going to voicemail until Louis finally weaseled Maya’s number from Lottie to call her and demand Liam come to the phone. She’d been at lunch with him, Liam unable to dodge it and, when Louis finally heard his voice over the phone, the first thing Liam had said was: “I was fucking drunk, man.”

“I didn’t even say anything,” Louis had replied.

“Come on, Lou,” Liam whined, Louis had pictured him rubbing his face in embarrassment, “we both know why you’re calling.”

“That why you haven’t been answering?”

“Louis—”

“Do you think you’re fucking slick?”

Liam had barked out a laugh at that. “No. Of course not. I figured you’d hear it right away.”

Louis hadn’t told him that, no, he didn’t; it took his band telling him who it was for him to figure it out.

“I’m keeping it in.”

Liam hadn’t said anything in so long that Louis thought the call dropped or Liam had hung up on him, so convinced he even pulled the phone away from his face, looked at the screen to confirm that they were still connected.

“Liam?”

“I don’t. . .”

“What?” Louis had retorted. “Not a good idea? Should’ve thought of that before dragging Harry to your recording studio in the middle of your fucking birthday party, Payno.”

“We were drunk!” Liam protested.

“Doesn’t matter now, does it?”

“Louis—”

“What’s done is done and, for better or for worse, I’m going through with it.”

“For worse, I’m thinking,” Liam had muttered. “Simon will kill you.”

“Yeah? What more can he do to me?”

Liam had sucked in a breath, pausing for so long that Louis almost took back the words as if they hurt Liam more than they hurt him.

“You gave me this,” Louis had added, softly, “and I’m keeping it.”

“Then why are you calling me?”

“To make sure you remembered what you’d done, dickhead, I just got chewed out by my whole fucking band ‘cause of you.”

Liam had laughed again, loud through the phone, repeating the phrase to Maya until Louis had also distantly heard her laugh in his ear.

“See you at Niall’s?” Liam had asked.

“See you at Niall’s,” Louis confirmed.

So, here he is, at the front desk of West Hollywood’s fucking Sunset Tower, a hotel Niall rented out for the occasion _(“You only turn 26 once, Lewis. Besides, I’ve always wanted to, and they offered.”_ ) telling the concierge that, no, he will not be purchasing chips for Niall’s poker tournament, and it’s all Liam Payne and his magnificent brain’s fault (and only partially Louis’ promise to shell out hundreds of thousands of dollars for four fucking luxury cars).

“Just a room with one queen?” she asks.

Louis chokes back laughter. “Yep.”

He slides his Amex over the counter, and she takes it, glancing at the name, furrowing her brows and then looking up at his face.

“Problem?”

“I believe I already have a room registered under that name,” she says, placing the card back, the black glinting in the warm, harsh light.

“What?” It’s Louis’ turn to furrow his brows. “I was told by the host we claimed rooms when we arrived.”

The concierge—Mary, Louis reads on her nametag—types hurriedly on the computer, nails clacking. “For most guests this weekend that is the case, yes, but Mr. Horan has reserved several floors for special guests.”

“Of course he has,” Louis mutters, fishing his phone out of his pocket to draft an angry text to an Irishman probably already expecting it.

“Ah, yes,” Mary says cheerfully, “here you are Mr. Tomlinson, a suite on Mr. Horan’s penthouse floor.”

Mary slides a keycard over the marble countertop as Louis’ stomach clenches. If he’s on the same floor as Niall, he has a feeling he’s not going to get a wink of sleep tonight and will likely be hungover for the next 5-7 business days.

 **LOUIS:** what are you playing at

 **NIALL:** r u here yet? :D

 **LOUIS:** why did you get to decide where I’m sleeping

 **NIALL:** so I know where to send people if you try to escape the festivities :D

 **LOUIS:** this is YOUR birthday pal, shouldn’t be worrying bout me

 **NIALL:** exactly, so what I say goes. Now get upstairs I’m pouring u a glass

 **LOUIS:** you already drunk? It’s not even 4pm.

 **NIALL** : :D

Louis pockets his phone with a head shaking in resignation, matching Mary’s dazzling smile with a fake one of his own as he accepts the keycard with his room number on an envelope. His stomach clenches again, a familiar but long since last felt sense of dread settling in his bones.

**_> > Better with You < <_ **

The Sunset Tower’s Terrace is massive; taking up the entire roof of the 15-story building so you feel as though you’re looking down on the entire city of Los Angeles. Niall’s decked the place out with poker tables on one side, a celebrity chef Louis’ already forgotten the name of on the other, and a dance floor with a DJ he’s never heard of smack dab in the middle. The bar has several bartenders that know more bottle tricks than Louis’ ever seen, and he’s struck by the sudden thought that he doesn’t know the right people in LA.

He hadn’t considered Niall would know the right people in LA either, but Louis supposes that Niall’s made enough American friends so impressed by his overwhelming friendliness that they were likely thrilled to help him plan his Hollywood Birthday Bash. It’s not that Louis doesn’t have American friends, it’s that Louis doesn’t prefer America. He didn’t think Niall would either, but he hasn’t had the time to analyze his friend’s choice of birthday location, nor the reason to (unlike one year for Louis’ birthday where Niall had planned the entire thing at a gay club and, despite everyone under the sun knowing it was perfect for him, Louis had to explain that he couldn’t _do_ that).

But when Louis is served his drink—the bartender not allowing him to order his own (another one of Niall’s birthday decrees) and instead guessing what he’d like after a two-minute conversation with him—it’s a concoction of vodka, lemon juice, rum, and fucking midori that turns the entire thing lime fucking green, he has to laugh out loud. So loud, in fact, that the bartender nearly takes offense and several people around him cease their lively discussion to stare at him with wide eyes.

Louis mumbles an apology, sipping the drink to find out it tastes really fucking good and gives the bartender a thumbs up, which seems to satisfy everyone enough to finally avert their eyes from him and appease the man who’d so artfully crafted his drink (but Louis puts some cash in the tip jar for good measure).

But Louis’ loud laughter had become a beacon for another person, who followed the sound until he was brushing up against Louis’ back, palming his shoulder and mumbling a relieved “ _Louis”_ into his ear.

It’s Harry—because of course it’s Harry—Louis doesn’t even have to turn to know it’s Harry, but he does anyway, whirling around with the red straw still stuck in his mouth like he’s a fucking child, breathing “ _Harry_ ” into the ice cubes like it’s a spell.

“I didn’t recognize anyone here,” Harry says, voice light and feathery and humorous and _Harry_ , “was getting nervous I was at the wrong hotel.”

Part of Louis’ brain tugs at him, telling him it’s a lie because Louis knows people here and if Louis knows them, there’s a high chance Harry knows them, but, at the same time, he remembers that he can’t make that assumption anymore.

But Louis doesn’t have to think of an answer—not that he could anyway—because Harry’s eyes flick down to the painfully green drink in Louis’ hand.

“What, erm. . . what are you drinking?”

Louis inhales, accidentally sucking the breath through the straw and pulling liquid out to jet into the back of his throat. He coughs, sputtering, as he turns back to the bar. “Don’t know,” he manages between dry heaves.

“Green Demon,” the bartender offers and now Louis’ laughing and coughing.

“’course it is,” he mumbles. He considers jumping off the roof now to save himself some trouble.

But Harry is unphased, looking over Louis’ head at the bartender, who’s still watching them with inquisitive eyes. “I’ll take one.”

“That’s not how this works; you have to—” Louis starts, but the bartender’s already blazed past him, giving Harry a once over with his eyes before declaring:

“coming right up,” and pulling out all the bottles he had just returned to their rightful place.

Louis’ glad he’s already coughing because he would have started up again just to cloak the deep shade of red his face is blushing.

Harry leans back against the bar, elbows sliding against the marble as he looks up at the twinkling lights strung above them. Louis’ finished sputtering, instead wedging the straw between his two upper teeth as he bites it and desperately trying—and failing—not to look at the way Harry’s forearms flex against his own weight—two habits he thought—hoped—he broke.

Instead of obliging the painful pull of gravity tempting Louis to sway into Harry’s shoulder, he resists it and shuffles farther away, leaning closer to a stranger which is somehow infinitely more comfortable. It’s futile, though—as most attempts at resisting Harry are—because his flowery, woodsy scent has already wafted into Louis’ nostrils and he’s getting more drunk on it than the green concoction in his hand.

“You don’t know anyone here?” Louis blurts out, a question that is a response to a question Harry didn’t even ask. Louis’ mouth is no longer consulting his brain. He bites his tongue, hisses from the sting of the alcohol at the same time he welcomes it. _God, he needs to be much drunker_.

“Niall,” Harry responds, voice light and the sides of his lips quirking up. His left dimple makes a brief appearance, but Louis doesn’t let himself get lost in it. Harry tilts his head to look at Louis, looking down at him out of the corner of his eye, and there’s a jovial light in them that Louis recognizes as distantly familiar. “Lewis, Shawn, James, Liam. . .” Harry trails off, mischief entering his gaze instead as he raises a solitary eyebrow (he’s always been too good at that, Louis thinks). “You.”

It comes out of him like a breath, soft in Louis’ ears as if the word could caress his skin. Louis doesn’t swoon—he _doesn’t_ —but something swells up in him that threatens to spill out in either the form of over-honesty he isn’t yet drunk enough to share or actual vomit.

“Oh,” Harry adds, rescuing Louis once more from his own lack of inhibition, looking over his head again, this time back towards the entrance to the Terrace, where the elevators are. “Julia too.”

But Louis doesn’t look, he drinks the man in instead. In this social but somehow intimate setting, Louis is struck by how often they used to do this: enter their own little world, just the two of them, no matter how many other people surrounded them. He wants to savor it, isn’t sure when the next time will come. He feels like a voyeur in his own body, like he shouldn’t be here. At the same time, though, Louis feels he shouldn’t be anywhere else _but_ here; beside Harry, watching him exist whether he acknowledges Louis’ adoration or not.

“Here you go.”

The bartender finishing Harry’s Green Demon tears both of their attention away, luckily for Louis, who would’ve disintegrated into a dusty pile of embarrassment if Harry caught him staring. He slides the green alcoholic concoction across the bar to Harry, the glass bumping against his elbow as he turns.

“Thanks,” Harry says warmly, opening his wallet and shoving some cash in the tip jar before he even tries the drink. A smile tugs on Louis’ lips as he takes a sip of his own.

Harry pulls the red straw out of his drink, abandoning it to roll back to the bar. Louis watches its trail until he notices Harry pulling the glass up to his lips, tipping it back and taking a long gulp. Louis watches him: the way his Adams apple bobs as he swallows, his strong jaw line shifting beneath his skin, his lower lip shining from the condensation on the clear glass. Louis thinks he can see a glimpse of his tongue—Harry always eats and drinks tongue-first and Louis always considered it horribly adorable—and teeth, but he forces his eyes away as Harry pulls the drink back.

“ _Fuck_ , that’s good” Harry mumbles, but it’s more like a moan and Louis almost chokes again, this time sucking too much air too fast into his lungs, resulting in a dramatic hiss.

Harry looks down at him, eyelashes fluttering, and Louis wants to scowl—it’s not _fair_ : he’s already embarrassingly tipsy considering Niall poured his first beer four fucking hours ago and Harry is stone sober, knowing damn well everything he’s doing to Louis are things he used to do to drive him crazy—but he _can’t_ because there’s warmth spreading from the alcohol in his belly into his veins and making his brain all floaty all the while Harry is grinning at him with one fucking dimple caved in his cheek and pupils blown like a goddamn _puppy_ and Louis is suffocating on his cologne and his entire fucking _presence_.

Louis is aware his jaw has dropped, his straw dangling stupidly from his gaping open mouth, the very end of the plastic still stuck between his teeth and the side adhered to his lip with his saliva, but he can’t find it in himself to care as Harry simply brings the glass back up to his lips and swallows the whole thing down in several exaggerated gulps.

He returns the glass to the marble bar with a loud clink and a dramatic flourish, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, his rings reflecting light back into Louis’ face like he’s a goddamn crystal ball. His lips shine a deeper shade of pink than they usually are from the wetness and alcohol, and when he darts out the tip of his tongue to swipe over his bottom lip, there’s an imperceptible tinge of green there.

But Louis sees it. He always does.

“That’s better,” Harry declares, but his voice is soft, like it’s only for Louis to hear. “Now I think I know more people.”

Louis blinks, tonguing the very end of the straw still wedged between his teeth as if it’s a lifeline. It’s a reference to how they used to get through these parties—it _has_ to be—a long-time joke that the drunker they got, the more people they seemed to recognize. But the memory feels ancient, like it’s from another life, like it doesn’t belong in Louis’ brain anymore, like it isn’t his at all.

“See you around, Louis,” Harry breathes into Louis’ ear and he is gone, Louis’ eyes still concentrating on the spot he just vacated.

Louis lingers for just a moment before turning back to the bar, forcing his eyes not to dart behind him where Harry disappeared, instead flagging down the bartender.

“Shot of vodka, please,” Louis demands, his voice coming out a much lower octave than he expected. He clears his throat. “Make it two.”

The bartender raises an eyebrow. “Tonight, I’m supposed to—”

“I don’t care,” Louis interrupts, fighting the twinge in his mind urging him to stop; that he’s being rude for the sake of desperation—Louis grimaces; seeing Harry has made him _desperate_. Harry has already permeated Louis’ being, absorbed into his bones, just from the simple interaction. He puts some more cash in the tip jar for good measure. “Two shots of vodka.”

The bartender looks at Louis, then at the cash, and decides it isn’t a battle worth fighting at the moment, turning behind him to get a handle of top shelf vodka and two shot glasses.

Louis takes them back to back, chasing them both with what remains of his Green Demon.

“Want another?” the bartender offers without hesitation, already picking up the empty cocktail glass.

Louis nods, grimacing at the residual vodka still present on the back of his tongue. The bartender turns to make him another drink, already reaching for the midori, when something occurs to Louis as suddenly as Harry had originally appeared that night.

“You got any cherries back there?”

He chews one, the bartender adding one to his Green Demon too, and Louis watches it as it floats for a moment before sinking below the ice to be emersed entirely in lime green. Louis picks up the glass and raises it in a silent _cheers_ to the bartender.

“Here’s to knowing more people,” he mutters, closing his eyes tight as he chugs the drink as fast as he can, so he doesn’t stare at the lime green as it disappears. But, it doesn’t matter, because the back of Louis’ eyelids are imprinted with a different shade of green; one that haunts Louis’ journals, songs, dreams, and waking thoughts—a green he can never seem to shake, no matter how far he tries to run from it.

**_> > Come So Far < <_ **

By the time the official party winds down, Louis has somehow met everyone else who was invited, but never stumbled across Harry again. He isn’t sure if it’s because he’s drank so much that everyone seems familiar or if they just kept narrowly missing each other like the way their lives had serendipitously aligned before the X-Factor auditions.

But, also like the way their lives finally crossed paths, when the after party begins in Niall’s penthouse suite, Louis and Harry wind up across from each other on the circle of couches.

Louis is sandwiched between Lewis and Liam, with Harry on one end of the couch across from them, beside Shawn and Julia, while a few other “VIP” guests Niall dubbed worthy of the 2am “kickback” litter the rest of the seating area. Niall’s seated in his own big puffy chair, limbs draped over the sides of it like he’s a drunk king, which, Louis supposes, isn’t entirely untrue.

Someone’s started passing around a blunt, the thing already dwindling down to half its original size when Louis finally gets a pull at it. Niall’s going on some drunken tangent about some fucking golf thing that Louis can’t be bothered to pay attention to, glancing up at Harry as he meets his eyes at the same time.

Louis takes a long drag, pointedly slow, as Harry blinks at him with heavy eyelashes. He holds the smoke in his lungs as he passes it blindly to Liam, unwilling to break this heavy eye contact with Harry. It’s like there’s a string tying them together, neither of their gazes wavering. Louis even inhales deeper, allowing the oxygen to press the high more effectively into his lungs before he finally blows out the smoke in a cloud directed at Harry. It fans over his face before dissipating on his cheeks like smokey freckles, eyelids fluttering closed as his mouth parts, tiny white flecks of his teeth peeking out from behind his red, alcohol-bitten lips.

When Harry opens his eyes again, they’re hooded and somehow greener than before, striking from even the short distance. He blinks, slow and drunk, but doesn’t tear his gaze from Louis’, tugging his bottom lip between his teeth before swiping his tongue over it—the pink turned nearly entirely green now. Louis watches, swallowing. His gaze darts between Harry’s eyes and his lips, aware of how painfully obvious he’s being, but he can’t bring himself to care as Harry’s eyes darken.

There’s a heat of arousal curling low in Louis’ belly, his bones vibrating under his skin as if they’re ready to haul Harry over his shoulder and carry him out of the room and into the hallway. This isn’t a hotel they’ve fucked in yet.

“Louis.”

His name is mumbled, whispered almost, and Harry’s mouth is moving, maybe forming his name on his lips, but the one Louis hears is from next to him—not Harry.

“What,” he mumbles, but it isn’t a question; sounds vaguely like a threat, even.

“Louis,” This time it’s more insistent.

Louis turns his head, finding Liam’s hazy drunk eyes wide at him, brown depths concerned and eyebrows furrowed.

“Are you ‘right?” Liam asks?

Now Louis is concerned, confused. He can feel Harry staring at his profile, is tempted to glance his way just to catch him in the act, but he keeps his attention on Liam. “’course.”

Liam’s elbow nudges his right arm. Louis follows his gaze and notices that his hand is fisting his trousers, clawing at the material on his leg so hard his knuckles are turning white. He hadn’t even realized he was doing it. He releases the hold, his fingers sore from the pressure. _How long had he been doing that?_

“Oh,” Louis responds, staring down at his own hand.

By their own volition, Louis’ cheeks heat a deeper hue of pink. He can feel Liam’s eyes on his face, Harry’s too—whether they’re aware of each other’s gaze, he isn’t sure—but he feels like he’s being analyzed. He shifts in his seat.

Realization crashes over him like a wave. _What the fuck is he doing?_

“Need a smoke,” Louis decides, muttering it to himself and anyone listening.

Despite being in his own little world, Niall perks up and hears him. “Already smoking, Tommo,” he laughs.

“Tobacco, Horan,” Louis snaps, the response coming out a bit more hostile than he intended. He stands, avoiding both Liam and Harry’s eyes, palming the pack of cigarettes in his pocket. To lessen whatever blow he didn’t mean to deal, he adds: “will be back in soon. Don’t party too hard without me.”

Niall laughs. “Too late.”

Louis steps around the maze of legs in the middle of their little party circle, moving on the outside of the couches to reach the door to the balcony.

“Let’s turn on some fucking music, then,” Niall says as Louis’ pulling the door open, a rush of cool air wafting over his face, “get this party started _again_.”

People clamber to their feet, Louis’ exit forgotten as the door closes behind him.

The balcony doors are glass, but they apparently do a tremendous job of blocking sound, because it’s almost as if Louis has stepped into a different world entirely: the party abandoned behind him. LA is a haunting presence below him, though, traffic still turning and the lights of the city so bright that the sky turns into this dark, dull, grey void.

As he pulls out a cigarette and his lighter, Louis leans against the edge of the balcony, the edge of it digging into his forearms. He can barely hear his lighter click as he lights his cigarette, the sound of his own blood rushing is loud in his ears. He squeezes his eyelids shut as he places the cylinder between his lips, as if he could close his eyes tight enough, he’d end up in a different spot.

The tobacco and nicotine are welcomed into his lungs, finding a home amongst the already absorbed weed. He heaves out the smoke in a sigh, opening his eyes in resignation that he won’t magically teleport elsewhere—his own bed, ideally, away from any sort of prying eyes, especially the ones that can read him with just once glance—and the cloud joins the smog gathering around him.

The door opens and shuts behind him, the party invading his façade of serenity on the balcony in a brief cacophonous flourish. He knows it’s Harry—doesn’t even have to turn to know, he feels the very air around him shift. He grips the cigarette between his fingers tighter, as if it would have fallen from his perch over the balcony’s railing. He pretends not to notice how his hands shake as he brings the vice up to his mouth; pulls at it, inhales, revels in the warmth in his chest, then—exhales, softly, as if he’s afraid to disturb the very welcome intruder. He’s so aware of Harry’s presence beside him that Louis’ every atom is on edge.

As Harry fills the void of darkness next to him, Louis’ periphery fills with a shadow of curled hair, sharp nose and even sharper jawline. He mirrors Louis’ position, draping himself over the balcony’s railing to look at the city below. The warmth that has been lingering in Louis’ chest from the smoke shifts to next to him, seems to materialize into this human being. The coolness of the California evening disappears with Harry’s presence. Louis hates that he still does that to him—brightens him, sends a familiar feeling of home into his veins, just by standing close enough to touch. Even after all this time, he is rendered brainless by this close proximity. He has to take another drag to keep his mind steady.

“Beautiful,” Harry mumbles, out over the city. An abrasive, loud car horn blares to contradict him, but he doesn’t take it back, instead heaving out a content sigh, leaning heavier into the railing. But Louis is more drawn to the other breaking the silence first, for once. It was always Louis. But now it is Harry.

“You always liked LA more than I did,” Louis says. He isn’t sure why he says it, wants to take it back as soon as he’s breathed it out into the world. It isn’t true. Well—it isn’t entirely true. Neither of them liked LA, preferred London or home with their families, and LA could never be that. But Harry liked the grandeur of LA, basked in the warmth of the sun and the people he knew. Harry was always a people-person, loved that he could turn any corner and run into someone he barely knew and strike up a conversation like they were old friends. Harry liked feeling on top of the world and it’s as easy to feel like that as a boyband sensation in LA.

But Louis supposes that that might not be true anymore. Or, as he’s learned about some things, it might have _never_ been true; when Harry played pretend back then, it was sometimes even with Louis—it was easier to force everything down than to confront their circumstances. Better to put on a brave face than to face _why_ they had to be brave. Things would be a lot different if they hadn’t made the band—some of it, most of it, any of it—some things better, other things worse. But Louis wouldn’t change it. Despite it all, he wouldn’t, because even though Harry is close enough to touch but has never felt farther away, Louis still knows Harry, loves him with every fiber of his being, and he would never, ever change that. Even if the only thing standing between him and a fall from the edge of a cliff is a declaration that he’d be better off if he’d never auditioned for X-Factor, he’d sooner tumble into the rocky shore of an ocean than wish Harry away.

In the grand scheme of things, meeting the love of his life might be considered a shit consolation prize for all the trauma and suffering, but Louis still wouldn’t take it back—any of it. Because it brought him to Harry, let them love each other—even if it was just for a short period of time. And that’s enough.

Harry doesn’t answer Louis’ statement, instead holds out his fingers delicately in front of Louis’ own holding the cigarette. He glances between Harry’s fingers and his eyes, a soft smile on his lips that doesn’t reach the green of his eyes.

“You don’t smoke tobacco,” Louis says stupidly. It’s a fact—he knows it is—but he becomes hesitant because he might—Harry’s changed, just as much as Louis has, if not more (because being alone had truly helped Harry blossom. Louis tells himself that it’s not his fault, it was the band, the contracts, their management, but he can’t help but see that Harry became himself as soon as he was no longer tethered to Louis).

But Harry shrugs and his fingers remain lingering in the air in front of Louis. “It’s a party.”

Louis furrows his brows, his drunken mind racing to figure out what’s happening, and he’s about to hand the cigarette over to Harry—because he can’t just say _no_ to him—when Harry drops his hand and lowers it into the pocket of his impossibly tight printed pants. Louis’ eyes follow the motion but snap back up when he’s far too tempted to examine the curve of Harry’s ass.

Harry pulls a blunt out of his pocket and presents it over the balcony railing, the city lights twinkling in the background.

“How about we smoke this instead, then?” he offers.

 _We_ Louis nearly breathes, but he doesn’t, he chokes it back, lets Harry’s voice echo in his head: _we_. Harry and Louis. _We._

“Stole it off of Lewis,” Harry explains. But he must see the incredulous look that sweeps Louis’ face for a moment because he amends: “well, I asked him for it. And he gave it to me.”

Harry’s lips are stretched into that half smile he gets when he’s trying to suppress a real smile, the corners of his mouth twitching upward and his left dimple threatening to make an appearance.

“Can you light it?” Harry asks and his voice settles over Louis like a fog, like he can feel his words around him.

“Okay,” Louis murmurs, smashing out his cigarette and discarding it into the ashtray.

Harry puts the blunt between his lips and leans forward, further into Louis’ space as he pulls the lighter out of his pocket. Harry’s eyes don’t look down at the blunt, but into Louis’, who meets his gaze. He doesn’t break the contact even as he flicks the sparkwheel three times and the flame ignites. Harry finally blinks, glancing down at the end of the blunt as it hovers inside the flames until it is on fire. Louis just watches Harry, basks in the warm glow of his skin from the flame, sees the shadows of his cheeks as they hollow out to suck air into his lungs and ensure the blunt is properly lit.

When the blunt is glowing on one end, Louis pockets his lighter. But Harry doesn’t step back into his original spot as Louis had expected. Instead, he brings his body closer to Louis so he has to tilt his head up to look him in the eye and watch him as he takes a drag of the blunt.

Louis sways on firmly planted feet, his body torn between taking a step back and invading Harry’s space. He can feel his eyelids grow heavy, his blinking hooded and slow, his body thrumming with warmth as he watches Harry’s lips mold around the blunt—deep pink contrasting with a dark brown.

Harry seems to notice Louis’ turmoil because he cocks his head and raises his chin in a challenge, daring Louis to move. Louis feels the gaze in his bones. He doesn’t even flinch.

When smoke is already trailing out of his nostrils from Harry holding his breath for so long, he finally pulls the blunt away from his mouth and exhales the same pointed way Louis did inside earlier, forcing all of the smoke to fan over the latter’s face. Louis’ eyes flutter the way Harry’s did and he inhales, smelling weed and LA and _Harry_ all over him. He keeps his eyes closed, eyelashes pressing heavily against his cheekbones as he inhales deeper, so much that it sounds like a sigh. There’s something intoxicating about being in Harry’s presence again—Louis is high on it and never wants to come down.

He opens his eyes when he hears Harry sucking on the blunt again, eyelids lowered sensually until his irises are barely peeking out, but Louis can see the striking green even in the dark. Harry hollows out his cheeks just as he did the first time, sucking as much smoke as he can into his lungs. Louis is suddenly struck by the thought to make sure Harry brought his inhaler.

Louis opens his mouth to ask—to see if it’s in his pocket or if he at least needs to go to his room to get it before they continue—but the words catch in his mouth, they never make it from his brain to his tongue, and his jaw drops open feebly, no sound or even breath coming out.

Harry is a vision—his shadowy, angular face haloed by his own hair and the light from the city and the hotel around them. He oozes power and warmth all at once, is so wrought with sensuality with that fucking blunt between his lips that Louis can barely stand upright, much less put together a cohesive thought. How can Louis possibly think when he looks like _that_ in front of _him_ for the first time in several years?

But Harry takes Louis’ hesitation to mean something else. He sees Louis’ mouth drop open and his lips part and something must register as familiar in Harry’s intoxicated brain because one second he’s inhaling the blunt, stood tall with his chin high in a challenge to Louis, and the next he’s leaning down with the blunt out of the way and the back of the hand holding it pressed against his cheek, puckering his lips into a silent _oh_ and blowing the smoke between Louis’ parted lips.

Distantly, Louis recognizes that they’ve done this before, did this often, in fact, but he can’t help the way his gut clenches and warmth swirls into his groin like it’s the first time. He stutters a surprised breath, shakily inhaling Harry’s smoke, and he can _taste_ him on his tongue. Their noses nearly touch, Louis can feel the heat of Harry’s against his own, but just as Louis is about to throw caution to the wind, say _fuck it_ and breathe Harry’s name into his mouth before he crashes their lips together—

Harry leans away, taking his heat with him. Louis’ eyes flutter open—he hadn’t even realized they’d shut—and his heart clenches in confusion. Harry’s eyes are wide, something resembling fear swimming in their green depths, Louis can see it even in the dark.

“Fuck,” Harry mumbles, but his voice is loud, so harsh and abrupt in Louis’ ears that he nearly flinches. Harry takes a wide step back. “’m sorry, Lou, I—” Harry runs a nervous hand through his curls, tugging on the ends of them. “I shouldn’t’ve done that, ‘m sorry.”

There’s flight transparent in Harry’s eyes; he’s about to run from Louis—physically and metaphorically—flee back into Niall’s hotel suite and break this sliver of intimacy that Louis has been craving since that last moment in his LA penthouse all those years ago, about to reverse time and bring them back to where they started and that sends such grief spiraling into Louis’ veins that he has to think of something—anything—to make Harry stay and he opens his mouth to say something—anything—like _it’s okay, I wanted you to_ or _please do it again_ or even _I’m so fucking in love with you please don’t leave me again_ but what comes out is:

“I listened to the song.”

The declaration has the desired effect, though, even as Louis grimaces with what his mouth decided to blurt out, Harry freezes, still halfway deciding between returning to the party and (perhaps) jumping off the roof (Louis is only mildly comforted by the role reversal).

“My song,” Louis clarifies hastily, coughing and shifting in discomfort under Harry’s calculating gaze, but he doesn’t break the eye contact. “ _We Made It_.”

At the title of the song, Harry visually relaxes, all of his muscles relieved of their tension as he lets out a heavy breath. His gaze softens at Louis, the warmth in his green eyes finally present instead of the fear that had been flashing in them moments before, the recognition easing the strange chemical warfare between them.

“Oh,” Harry breathes, his voice light again. The corners of his mouth twitch. Not quite a smile, but he isn’t scowling, embarrassed and confused, anymore either.

“Yeah,” Louis replies softly. It’s his turn to beckon for the vice between Harry’s fingers, stretching out his right hand with his index and middle finger separated. Harry obliges, reaching forward and placing the blunt between fingers, their skin brushing. Louis tries to ignore the heat that spreads from Harry’s touch.

Bringing the blunt to his lips, Louis takes a step out of this bubble they’ve created between each other and turns to lean against the railing again, looking out over the city instead of meeting Harry’s gaze. He’s broken the unspoken tension for them both, despite how much it hurt. They’re always dancing around what they want to say—no different than it was before—but it’s not the time, not the place; it never is.

“’s a fun little project you and Liam cooked up,” Louis says after a drag, blowing the smoke over the city.

Harry lingers where he froze for a moment, staring at Louis with his eyebrows furrowed, until he also decides the moment is passed and leans against the balcony railing.

“t’was mostly Liam,” Harry offered. He’s looking at him still, Louis can see him in her periphery, lips pursed and eyebrows lowered as he tries to read Louis’ profile.

“Mm,” Louis hums. “Guess you can’t say no to him on his birthday.”

That drags a short snorting laugh from Harry. “No. He was quite insistent.”

Louis takes another pull from the blunt, keeping the weed in his lungs for an extra beat so the high as an opportune chance to permeate his consciousness. He exhales deeply, transferring the blunt to his left hand and extending it back to Harry. He doesn’t look as the latter accepts it, putting it between his own lips. Harry takes two drags of his own before handing it back to Louis.

The pair is silent for a while, transferring the blunt back and forth over the railing of the balcony, as they watch the world turn below them, around them. The music is louder from the party behind them, Louis can distantly hear Niall shouting along to some hip hop lyrics, and the traffic below them is still present even though it’s nearing four am.

It’s Harry that breaks the silence again.

“What did you think?” His question is soft, barely above a whisper, voice so quiet Louis can barely hear him over the sounds around them.

Louis takes the last drag of the blunt, just on the edge of all ash, and stamps out the embers, placing the abandoned roach into the ash tray next to the cigarette butts. He sighs, leaning more heavily into his forearms, the edge of the railing digging into his skin.

“Frustrating.”

“ _Frustrating?_ ” Louis can hear Harry’s confusion— _feel_ it—he doesn’t have to turn to see it.

“Frustrating,” Louis confirms. He tips his chin towards his chest, looking at the street directly below them, speaks into his own skin. “I had worked on that song for _months_ , had the lyrics written for _years_ , fucked around in the studio once we’d recorded it for _so long_ and it still didn’t sound right until Liam—until _you_ got your hands on it.”

Harry inhales audibly—sucking in a breath between his lips. “Louis. . .”

“This thing that was mine—this solo song on my first solo album; no features on the whole thing—this song, even though it was about us, it was _mine_ , completely mine; with _out_ you.” Louis leans further down, resting his chin on his own arm, hiding his face from Harry’s inquisitive gaze. “And you come along and make it perfect. _Perfect_ , Harry, do you get that? It was great before—good, maybe, at the least—but you made it perfect; _perfect_. Do you know how infuriating that is?”

“Louis. . .” Harry starts again, but Louis notices his voice is closer. Louis turns his head, pressing his lips into his own shoulder, peering up at Harry, who has indeed stepped closer, his eyebrows knit together, eyes concerned. “I’m. . .”

But Louis isn’t done yet: “It’s my song, it’ll always be my song; it’s got my lyrics, my composition, my tracks, my voice. . . but all it needed was a couple of backtracks from you and it’s complete.” Louis lifts his head, more confident, but still bent in half leaning over the railing so Harry still has his height and has to look down at him. “This thing that seemed so complicated—like the song could never be what I wanted it to be—that it couldn’t be fixed, turned out to be so simple. All it needed was you. And that’s _frustrating_ , Harry.” Louis trails off, sucking in the words he wants to say: _because I don’t have you anymore_.

“Louis,” Harry mumbles again, stepping closer to him once more, but not so close that the electricity starts to crackle between them again. “I’m sorry, I—”

“Harry,” Louis interrupts, finally straightening upright and turning towards him again, so he can look Harry straight on. “You don’t have to apologize. I’m not asking you to. The song is _perfect_ , truly. I should be thanking you, really.” Harry opens his mouth to interrupt, but Louis keeps going. “It was a drunken idea that turned out to be fucking genius and there’s nothing wrong with that.”

Harry still looks apprehensive, something behind his eyes that Louis can’t quite place. “Is it—” his voice comes out choked, he has to clear his throat, bringing his fist up to his mouth. “Is it going to be on the album?”

Louis sucks on the inside of his lower lip, tugging it between his teeth. “Yeah,” he breathes, “yeah, I think so.” Harry blinks at him, features twitching. Louis frowns. “Is. . . is that okay?”

“Yes,” Harry rushes out, “of course, Louis, like you said, it’s _your_ song.” Harry’s features soften again, small smile quirking his lips. “And it’s wonderful, really, it is.”

Louis raises an eyebrow, the corner of his own mouth stretching into a crooked grin. “Just needed a bit of you,” he says before he can suck the words back into his mouth, but the weed has reached his brain and he’s permeated in honesty and warmth and _Harry_. “Not that there wasn’t any already.”

Harry falters at that, pupils blowing wider and mouth gaping like a fish as it’s his turn to sway from intoxication. If Louis is feeling the high, Harry certainly is too as he grips the railing with heavy hand to stay upright.

“Careful,” Harry mumbles. But Louis isn’t sure if he’s saying that to himself or to Louis, about their precarious physical situation, or the emotional uncharted territory they seem to be swimming towards.

Harry runs another nervous hand through his hair, letting his fingers linger in the tendrils spiraling over his ear. Louis watches the movement, wants to repeat it with his own hand and allow his fingers to get lost in the curls behind Harry’s neck, just to grasp his scalp, tug his head back, hear him gasp, watch his lips part.

Heat swirls between his legs again as he watches Harry’s muscles contract when he lowers his arm back to his side, the movement slow and calculated—as Harry tends to be. Louis’ eyes are drawn to his mouth when Harry swipes a tongue over his bottom lip, tugging it between his teeth. For the third or fourth time tonight—that he can count—Louis wants to kiss him.

“How?” Louis murmurs. He doesn’t register he’s said it until his own voice enters his ears.

“How what?” Harry asks, voice barely above a whisper.

Louis furrows his brows, unsure of what he was originally asking until the words just spill out of him without consulting his brain: “how am I supposed to be rid of you when it seems that everything in my life _needs_ you?”

Harry’s lips part, his tongue making a sound as it pulls wetly away from the roof of his mouth. He inhales, eyes flickering between Louis’ eyes and his lips as his own mouth opens and closes like a fish, attempting to form words he hasn’t decided on speaking yet.

“I don’t know,” Harry breathes.

And Louis is about to open his mouth, say that they should do something about that, but, at that moment, their bubble is shattered as the balcony door rips open, finally bringing the party outside as a few people wander into the fresh air and Tyler the Creator’s _See You Again_ spills outside.

Harry doesn’t move, still staring at Louis as if their moment hasn’t been interrupted. His lips part, form around empty sound again, before, barely, whispered so soft that Louis thinks he imagines it: “I haven’t figured that out yet either.”

And he is gone, disappearing for the second time that night into thin air, leaving Louis to stare at the empty spot Harry’s form just filled with a thousand questions, even more answers, and one important epiphany, but all Louis can process is Tyler singing: “ _I can only see your face when I close my eyes.”_ So he does.

>><<

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Please leave kudos & comments and share if you liked it :) All my love, xx


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